


Reel It In

by velvet_skyline



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Actor!Harry, Alternate Universe, Angst with a Happy Ending, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Enemies to Lovers, Famous Harry, First Meetings, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Jealousy, M/M, Misunderstandings, Non-Famous Louis Tomlinson, Slow Build, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-10
Updated: 2021-03-14
Packaged: 2021-03-17 01:55:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 43,523
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29959218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/velvet_skyline/pseuds/velvet_skyline
Summary: Harry Styles is Hollywood's newest breakout star, with a huge fanbase hanging off his every tweet. He’s just been cast in the much-anticipated film adaption of Don't Worry Darling, the popular novel . In other words, Harry has made it big.Louis Tomlinson couldn’t care less. He’s a stressed out PHD student working part time at a bookshop while he struggles to get into post-production.Needless to say, Louis is less than impressed when Don't Worry Darling starts filming in his hometown. And he certainly doesn’t want anything to do with obnoxious, arrogant, so irritatingly perfect leading actor Harry Styles.
Relationships: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson
Comments: 61
Kudos: 117





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> Hi guys, welcome to my new fic!! Hope you enjoy it!

**CAST LIST LEAKED FOR HIT NEW FILM**

_The latest film that everyone’s talking about – ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ – has been through a bit of a week, and we here at the Doncaster Star are happy to provide the latest scoop. Want to know more about the world of celebrity scandal for this, the most anticipated film of recent months? Then read on!_

  
_‘Don’t Worry Darling’, the eagerly awaited adaption of the infamous novel, was announced early last month. Since then, the shroud of secrecy surrounding the film has done nothing but increase the hype. Everyone in the industry has been tight-lipped and secretive, that is, until last week. Something slipped through the cracks, and there’s been a leak of a rather intimate nature._

  
_To be precise, we here at the Star have exclusive access to the cast list._

  
_And what a cast list it is! Of course, Taylor Swift as lead can hardly come as a surprise – her golden locks and bubbly smile were almost a given for this heartbreaker. The long list of men to play her various love interests contains some surprises, though, including Niall Horan, relatively unknown for one of the leading roles. The casting director must have seen more from him than we have!_

  
_But perhaps the least surprising of all is notorious Harry Styles, cast in the role of magnificent and eventually victorious heartthrob. We had no other actor in mind than this young heartbreaker to play the lead in ‘Don’t Worry Darling’. Styles has been making waves in the industry since being pulled out of his drama academy in only his first year, and has flitted from role to role ever since. And who could be surprised, with that poster-boy face of his?_

  
_‘Don’t Worry Darling’ has had more than just its cast revealed in the past week, though. Just a matter of hours later, the next big announcement came through (and perhaps this one was more planned) – the film location, we are happy to report, is right here in Britain! This news had been met with enthusiasm from the book’s large fanbase, as the author herself lives in London, and the book is set in a city very obviously based on England’s green and bountiful countryside. We can hardly say we are surprised._

_Perhaps the biggest news, certainly in this paper’s eyes, is that the location will be split – half of the filming done in studios in London, half on location in – you guessed it – Doncaster itself! That’s right, people, we’re getting some of that stardom here in our very own city. Don’t be too surprised if the traffic builds up, we’re expecting some celebs around here!_

Louis shoved the morning paper away from him with a grimace. What a load of rubbish. He didn’t buy tabloids for a reason, but the man who delivered the milk had started to leave the Doncaster Star on Louis’s doorstep along with his two pints, and Louis hadn’t the heart yet to tell him it was unwanted. Plus, the milkman arrived at some ungodly hour in the morning. As if Louis would be up to speak to him then.

  
This news was particularly unwelcome. Louis cringed at the thought of his precious city getting overwhelmed by some ridiculous film set, disruption everywhere just for one more below-par film to get its hour of fame. He didn’t recognise the names of any of the actors, not that he cared. Zayn would probably know.

  
Thinking of Zayn, he’d be here in five minutes and Louis was nowhere near ready. Gulping down the last of his coffee, Louis got to his feet, running a quick hand through his hair. He spent a few minutes shoving the majority of his dirty dishes into the sink until his buzzer went off.

  
Zayn entered the flat with his usual charming grin, despite the rather frazzled appearance of his usually well-styled hair. He walked straight passed Louis and into his kitchen, flicking the kettle on and grabbing a mug. “I’m in serious need of your help.”

  
“Hello to you, too,” Louis joked.

  
Zayn chuckled, but the sound was a little wild. “No, seriously, mate. My _entire_ editing programme crashed and I’d almost finished with it, but…”

  
“It’s ok,” Louis stopped him, “Have you got the files?”

  
Zayn waved a silver disc at him with a grin on his face.

  
“Cheers. Hold on then.” Louis turned and headed back through to his living room, sitting on the sofa and reaching for his laptop. His flat was pretty small, but Louis made the most of it. He’d been living there for the majority of his PHD, and the years had given him time to collect his odd bits-and-bobs and fill the empty white walls. Bursts of colour rose from every surface.

  
Zayn walked back through, balancing two steaming mugs. “I’ll pay you with coffee.”

  
“ _My_ coffee.”

  
“Still coffee.”

  
Louis grunted, and held out his hand for the disc. Zayn placed the two mugs on the tiny coffee table before settling down beside Louis, fixing him with a serious glance as he balanced the disc between them. “Now. This is of incredible significance.”

  
Louis arched a brow. “I’m aware.”

  
“It holds the entirety of my project. My _boss_ is going to see this.”

  
“I know,” Louis gave a solemn nod, holding his hand out palm-up. “I accept the severity of this responsibility.”

  
“ _Do you,_ though?”

  
“Zee, when’s this due?”

  
Zayn scratched the back of his head with his free hand. “Tomorrow morning.”

  
Louis sighed. “Then don’t you think you’d better give it to me?” He turned on his winning smile. “If you want it edited, anyway.”

  
“You make a good point.” After one more, long-suffering moment, Zayn finally handed over the disc into Louis’s palm. He covered his eyes with his hand. “I can’t watch.”

  
“Calm down, Zee.” Louis slid the disc into his laptop and pulled up his editing software. “It won’t take me long.”

  
“It has to be _perfect_.”

  
“Have I let you down before?”

  
“No, but there’s a first time for everything,” Zayn answered darkly, before giving his head a quick shake. “I didn’t mean that. I just. Ugh.” He got to his feet and paced around the tiny space between the sofa and the wall. “I just _really_ need this to go well.”

  
“It’s important, hm?” Louis was already buried in his software.

  
Zayn ran a palm over his face. “Mate, you have _no idea.”_

  
“It’s for your boss?”

  
“Yeah. You know, the guy who runs the entire company.” Zayn shuddered slightly. “He could make me the next best filmmaker in Britain, or he could end my career right now.”

  
Louis clucked his tongue in sympathy, his mouse unhesitating as it tracked across the screen. “It’ll make you. You’re brilliant.”

  
“But the editing is the part that always takes me the longest.” Zayn’s tone betrayed his underlying stress. “I was _so close_ to finishing when the bloody thing decided to crash…”

  
“Don’t worry,” Louis soothed, “I’m on it, and I’m the editing master.”

  
“You’d better bloody be.”

  
“My Phd says I am.”

  
Zayn snorted. “You don’t even have it yet.”

  
“Give it a few months.” Louis scrolled through the various clip of film, pursing his lips. “So do you want, like, these to all just run together?”

  
“Yeah, and a few jumpcuts.” Zayn hurried back around to Louis’s side, pausing in his pacing. “I have a list somewhere, wait…”

  
Louis continued to scroll through the clips as Zayn searched through his pockets, eventually extricating a crumpled up sheet of paper covered in illegible scribbles. He pressed it into Louis’s hand with all the reverence of a man giving up his first-born child.

  
Louis glanced through the list, then back at the clips, and grimaced. “This is going to take me a while, sorry, mate.”

  
“But can it be done?” his tone was desperate, and when Louis glanced at him, Zayn looked a little wild around the eyes.

  
Louis drew in a breath, placed the paper down on the table, and grabbed for his coffee mug. “I can do it. It’ll take a while, but I can do it.”

  
“You’re actually the best.”

  
“Yeah, well, you can repay me in food.”

  
“Takeout is on me,” Zayn promised.

  
Louis nodded distractedly as he started to piece the clips together, referring back to the sheet of paper. Zayn paced for a while longer, his gaze constantly flicking to Louis, following the tapping of his fingers with increasingly nervous eyes. He strode briskly around the living room.

  
Louis clicked his tongue after a while. “You’re going to wear holes in my carpet.”

Zayn paused, glanced down, and wrung his hands together. “I can’t just do _nothing_.”

  
“So don’t,” Louis answered distractedly. “Put the TV on. Light up a joint. Play games. Whatever you want.”

  
“I _want_ to _pace_.”

  
“Alright,” Louis shook his head, “Do whatever you want, as long as you don’t destroy my furniture.”

  
Zayn muttered to himself. He edged one more circuit around the living room, but after a charged glare from Louis, he resumed his seat beside Louis instead. His knee jigged up and down and he shifted restlessly, his fingers constantly fidgeting.

  
Louis edged away from him a little. “Seriously, Zee, you need to distract yourself.”

  
“How can I?! My life is literally in your hands.”

  
“I know. And I’m working on it.” Louis paused for long enough to send Zayn a calming stare. His friend really did look frazzled – his usually immaculate hair was sticking up haphazardly, and there were more lines than usual in his forehead.

  
Louis leaned forwards and nudged the newspaper, still open from earlier, in Zayn’s direction. “Distract yourself with that. And order some pizza. We’ll be here a while.”

  
Zayn picked up the paper, but his eyes stayed fixed on Louis’s.

  
Louis glanced back at him with an eye-roll. “Seriously, I’m working as fast as I can. You can always head home if you don’t want to stick around and wait.”

  
Zayn’s eyes widened in horror.

  
“Or stay here,” Louis held his hands up, then grabbed his laptop back. “But I’m not going to be much company, I’m afraid.”

  
“That’s perfectly fine,” Zayn rushed to emphasise. “You just – focus on your editing – and I’ll…” he glanced around distractedly, then settled for the paper in his hands. He leaned back into the sofa, forcibly relaxing.

  
The paper was still open on the article from earlier. Zayn’s brows shot up. “Wait – _Don’t Worry Darling_ ’s being filmed here?”

“Hm?” Louis barely glanced over. “Oh. Yeah. Apparently.”

  
“Woah sick!” Zayn buried himself in the article, his eyes flickering down the columns with interest. “Think they’d let me sneak onto set?”

  
“Why, do you want to steal the camera equipment?”

  
“Hilarious,” Zayn answered blandly. He continued to read through the article, nibbling on his lip. “Why’d you even get the _Star_ , anyway? Thought you hated tabloids.”

  
“I do. Comes with the milk.”

  
“Hmm.” Zayn acknowledged and continued to read in silence, though he gave a low whistle when he reached the leaked information. “Good cast list. Never heard of this Niall Horan, though.”

  
Louis hummed distractedly. “I’ve never heard of any of them.”

  
“Oi, come off it, yes you have.”

  
“Nope.”

  
Zayn rolled his eyes. “You’ve been with me and seen films with them in, so I know you have.”

  
“Really?” Louis paused in his editing for a moment to fix Zayn with an arched brow.

  
“Yeah. Taylor Swift was Eleanor in that one about the boyband.”

  
Louis narrowed his eyes. “Blonde? Long hair?”

  
“That’s her.”

  
“Oh yeah.” Louis turned back to his acting. “What about the other one?”

  
Zayn consulted the article again. “Oh, Harry Styles, yeah. You liked him.”

  
“Did I?”

  
“Yeah, he was in _Kiwi_.”

“Oh.” Louis brightened a little; he had genuinely liked that film. He wasn’t often keen on the Hollywood blockbusters that Zayn dragged him out to see – usually he just geeked about the editing, and let Zayn whine about the directing choices. But _Kiwi_ had been decent. “Who’d he play?”

  
“The lead. Alexander, was it? Alec?”

  
“Alex.”

  
“That’s it.”

  
“Huh.” Louis pursed his lips, his interest piqued despite himself. Alex was one of his favourite lead characters and the Louis though the film was one of the rare well-written historical films. Plus, the actor was pretty cute – from as much as Louis could tell, anyway. His face was interesting, with kind eyes full of warmth. And he had curly hair.

  
“Think we should check out the film set sometime?” Zayn asked, flipping through the rest of the article. “It’s going to be in the city centre for five months.”

  
Louis groaned.

  
“Oh, it won’t be that bad.”

  
“Traffic’s going to be a nightmare.”

  
“But you’ll get to see an actual film set,” Zayn pointed out.

  
Louis snorted. “I doubt they’ll let us that close. Plus, Don’t Worry Darling is a great book, and no film is ever going to be able to do it justice.”

  
Zayn shook his head. “You’re just prejudiced.”

  
Louis didn’t deny that. Instead, he buried himself back in his editing, focusing on getting the film clips smooth and fluent for his friend to hand in the next day.  
The hours passed smoothly. Zayn flicked through the rest of Lou

is’s paper – most of it was tabloid trash, gossip about celebrities, or local heart-warming stories that left him with a smile – and when that was done, he tossed the paper back onto the table. He went and made them more coffee, ordered them pizza, and stuck on a film.

  
Louis barely looked up from his laptop the entire time.

  
Eventually, far too late to still be awake, considering Louis had work tomorrow, the film was finished editing. He handed the disc back to Zayn, exhausted, and accepted his heartfelt thanks with the biggest smile he could muster. 

  
Once Zayn was out of the door, Louis could do little more than switch his laptop off, pull on his sweatpants, and collapse into bed.

  
…

  
The next morning, Louis was late for work.

  
He hurried through the busy Doncaster streets, coffee in hand, bag slung over his shoulder. The epitome of a working student – except, he was late. Louis hated being late. Usually, he left his flat with at least half an hour before he was due anywhere, but that morning he’d overslept. His eyes still itching from the late night editing, he had barely stumbled out of the flat, stopping off at his favourite café before rushing up the street towards his usual bus stop.

  
The only problem? The road containing his bus stop was closed.

  
_Closed._

  
Louis stopped at the edge of the road, joining a small group of people congregated around the big traffic cone with the sign that read ROAD CLOSED next to it.

  
Louis cursed softly. He dug into his pocket, juggling his coffee, and tugged out his phone, cursing again when he saw the time. He was going to have to walk to the next bus stop, which was a good fifteen minutes away, and he only had twenty minutes to get to work on time. The bus would be slower than ever if there were road closures. He was never going to make it.

  
“Bloody hell, why the hell would they close the roads?!” He muttered angrily to himself, jostled in the crowd.

  
“Maybe because of the filming,” a distinctly amused voice said from beside him.

  
Louis almost jolted out of his skin. Filming, right here? He blinked, peering further ahead of him, trying to see passed the crowds and traffic cone up into the closed road. “Filming?”

  
“I would presume so.”

  
Louis blinked again. He pursed his lips, growling. “Bloody Hollywood. What on earth possessed them to come _here_?”

  
“Aren’t you happy?” The mystery voice sounded surprised.

  
“God, no,” Louis scoffed. He sipped at his coffee, scalding his tongue.

  
“Why not?”

  
Louis shook his head, giving an irritated gesture to the road ahead of them. “Because of _this_! I’m late for work, my boss is going to kill me, and I can’t even get to the bloody bus stop because of some stupid second-rate film that’s never going to live up to the book.”

  
There was silence again, in which Louis sipped his coffee with irritated blue eyes.

  
Eventually, the voice answered, “So you don’t like film, huh?”

  
“On the contrary,” Louis disagreed, “I love film. I just don’t like mediocre adaptions.”

  
“How do you even know this one’s going to be mediocre?”

  
“I just do.” Louis scoffed. “Have you seen the cast list? Just more Hollywood trash.”

  
“Is that so.” The voice was cool.

  
“I think so, yeah.”

  
The crowd ahead of them cleared a little, and Louis pushed his way to the front. Now he paid more attention, the people around him were either stressed-looking people in suits, glancing at their watches in irritation, or hyped-up teenagers with eager eyes and bouncing feet. Probably trying to get a glance at the stars. Louis scoffed – the only one he remotely liked was Harry Styles, and that was only in the one role he’d seen him in.

  
The mystery voice, it seemed, had followed him. “So you’re, like, an indie movie fan.”

  
“I guess you could say that.” Louis ran a distracted hand through his hair. “I mean, not really.”

  
“Then what do you mean,” the voice demanded.

  
Louis scoffed. “Look, I really don’t have time to argue…”

  
“You’re already late, right?”

  
Louis rolled his eyes, turning on his heel to face the person standing behind him. It was a man – taller than Louis by a lot, which made him tower over the rest of the crowd. Louis barely spared him a glance, noticing twinkling green eyes, before he zeroed back in on his coffee cup and muttered, “Yeah, thanks to this damn film set.”

  
“I’m sure it’s not their fault.”

  
“Yeah, well,” Louis grunted sourly, “I’d just rather they took their crappy adaption elsewhere.”

  
The man raised one delicate brow. “Crappy adaption?”

  
“Probably. I mean, _Don’t Worry Darling_ is a great book, so it’d be difficult to do it justice even with good actors.”

  
The man’s brow raised higher. “Not impressed by the cast list?”

  
Louis shrugged with an eye-roll. “Same-old people picked for their pretty faces, I suspect.”

  
“Well, you certainly seem to know lots about it.” The voice was almost cutting.

  
“Not really. I just read the article in the tabloid.” Louis glanced back at the man, actually paying attention to him this time. His face was nice, sharply featured. His lips were twisted into just the hint of a smirk. He had brown hair styled in a pile of curls atop his head, and his eyes were an extremely piercing shade of green. 

  
_…Wait a minute…_

  
Louis took a hesitant step back, his eyes widening. This man looked exactly like Alex, his favourite character from _Kiwi_.

  
But that would mean…

  
The man tilted his head, his lips pulling into a wider smirk. He held himself proudly, tall and carrying it well, his stance almost arrogant. Just as Louis stared at him in growing horror, a voice from the closed road called out, “Styles! I see you there, get your arse out here before you hold up the filming anymore!”

  
_What. The hell?_

  
“Coming,” the man answered lazily. “As soon as I’m done mingling with the public.”

  
Louis’s face dropped.

  
_Fuck his life._

  
“Well, it seems I have to get to work,” the man drawled, his brown eyes filled with mirth. “You know. Have to try and make this film better than a crappy adaption.”

  
Louis’s face drained of all colour. He spluttered. “I didn’t – uh – I didn’t mean…”

  
“No?” The man snorted. “You seemed pretty certain to me.”

  
Louis nearly choked. He could feel the coffee roiling around in his stomach. “I didn’t – I didn’t know you were _you_!”

  
“Right. You’d have been spluttering niceties at me if you knew?”

  
“Probably.” Louis cursed himself inside his head. “No, wait. I would’ve. Um. You’re _Harry Styles_.”

  
The man chuckled. “I am aware.”

  
Louis just stared at him, his brain far too scrambled, his cheeks flaming. He tried to piece together enough words to salvage the situation, somehow, but the silence just stretched on, uncomfortably long.

  
Eventually, a voice yelled out from the road again. “ _Styles_! Here, now!”

  
Harry Styles just snickered. He placed a hand on Louis’s shoulder, gently moving him to the side. “I’ve got to get to work. Don’t make me any later.”

  
Louis stared after him, watching his long legs carry him through the crowd and into the road. He managed to splutter at his back, “ _You’re_ the one making _me_ late!”

  
Harry Styles merely chuckled, not bothering to turn around.

  
Louis glared after his back until he realised that the majority of the crowd were staring at him, open-mouthed. The rest were mooning after Harry Styles with adoring expressions.

  
Louis felt his cheeks flood with heat once more.

  
Clenching his hand around his coffee, Louis forced his feet to turn and carry him away up the street. He was impossibly late for work now, and his boss was going to shout at him, and by the time he reached the next bus stop he realised that none of them were even running because of the disruption caused by the filming.

  
The perfect start to the perfect day, he thought bitterly as he started the long, cold walk to work.

  
…

  
By the time Louis finally made it into work, he was almost a full hour late and tired and sweaty from the long walk. He apologised profusely to his manager, Liam, who met him at the door with a stern look.

  
“Well, I know it’s unlike you,” he answered with kind voice, gesturing to the armful of books in his grip, and another pile on the desk beside her. There were no customers in yet, but the lunchtime flow would start soon. “Take those upstairs for me?”

  
Louis obeyed, following him all the way up to the third floor of the shop. The bookshop was tiny, and rickety, and sprawled up along four floors in the corner of the high street. The walls were hung with red drapes, and every nook and cranny had an armchair, or a desk, or a slim window seat. The free wifi and café next door made it a hotspot for students; Louis often came here to do his PHD work, when he wasn’t on shift.

  
“I am really sorry,” he apologised again as he helped Liam stack the books onto their shelves.

“Everywhere is closed, took me an hour to walk here.”

  
“Didn’t you realise about the filming?”

  
Embarrassed, he coughed, and shook his head.

  
Liam studied him quietly before turning back to the shelf. “Don’t sweat mate, its fine. You’ll be prepared for next time.”

  
“Yeah, won’t happen again.” _At least as long as no more arrogant actors get in my way_. Louis could feel his cheeks heating up when he remembered the look on Harry Styles’ face, though it was more from anger than anything else. He’d been sure he was going to have a heart attack when he realised how much he’d insulted the casting for the film to _Harry Styles himself_. If he hadn’t been so unpleasant and arrogant, then Louis would almost have felt sorry for him. As it was, all Louis felt was anger, and a desperate hope that he would not have to run into Harry Styles again.

  
Work was quiet for the duration of his shift, but that was the way Louis liked it. He and Liam loitered by the cash register, or hunted through the shelves, and Louis picked up several more titles that caught his eye from their newest order. Perks of working in a bookshop; endless reading material. Down sides; his PHD often suffered for it.

  
Louis whiled away the hours curled up in an armchair, or stacking shelves, popping out for a quick coffee next door during his break. By the time his shift drew to a close, it was already getting dark outside. Louis wrinkled his nose at the prospect of walking all the way back to his flat – in this freezing end to winter, he’d be lucky if there wasn’t frost on the ground by the time he made it to his front door.

  
Shouldering his bag and shrugging on his coat, Louis said his goodbyes to Liam and then started the long, frozen walk home. The pavement rang under his footsteps, already crisping with frost that would no doubt lie thick on the ground in the morning. They might even get more snow soon. Louis shivered, drawing his coat tight around his form. He was going to have to remember to bring a scarf out with him.

  
Doncaster was quieter at this time, and it was eerie to see the usually busy roads deserted and empty. The road closures seemed to have taken over the majority of the centre, at least in this quarter of the city. A lot of disruption for one film set. Louis wondered what scenes they’d even be filming here – Don’t Worry Darling mostly took place indoors from what he could remember, though he supposed some of the larger countryside elements would need an outdoor setting.

  
The loud sounds and flashing lights coming from a few streets away shook him out of his thoughts. Louis narrowed his eyes. His route home passed by that street. Hesitantly, he began to wonder if he was even allowed to walk this way – the roads were closed to traffic, but there were no signs up to indicate anything about pedestrians. He pursed his lips. The city couldn’t come to a complete halt just because of some film – this was his home. 

  
Still, Louis slowed his steps to a more cautious pace as he edged up to the place he’d run into Harry Styles that morning.

  
Sure enough, the ROAD CLOSED sign still stood proud, blocking the adjacent street to the one Louis was walking along. There were a few people lurking nearby, peering out down the road, or talking in excited whispers. Louis paused for just long enough to glance up the road, taking note of a haze of smoke and some flashing lights. There were camera trails along the ground, and a number of tripod-like shapes were just visible through the smoky haze. A few shadowy figures wandered around together, too far for Louis to take note of who they were.

  
Filming was happening right here, then.

  
And right in Louis’s way.

  
He heaved a long-suffering sigh as he continued his way home. This disruption was awful – it was going to mean he’d have to leave a good hour earlier for work than he was used to. That was fine for a later shift, like todays, but sometimes he had to open up at 8am. Waking at 6 really didn’t feel acceptable to Louis. No, not at all.

  
He made it back to his apartment in the dark, closing the door firmly behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So... what did you guys think?? Let me know in the comments and don't forget to leave kudos if you enjoyed it!  
> I'll try to upload new chapters pretty frequently :)


	2. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A bit of larry interaction for you guys :P

Harry Styles was there again the next day.

  
Louis had another afternoon shift at the bookshop, but he’d forced himself to leave an hour earlier, coffee in hand, hair windswept and messy. He’d barely spared the film set a thought in his rush to get outside on time, but now, here he was, striding down the street towards the ominous ROAD CLOSED sign.

  
And there was an irritatingly familiar tall figure leaning against a wall.

  
There were a few other people standing near him, and Louis could hear their excited chattering even from ten paces away. Their phones were out, and they were snapping photos, and Harry Styles seemed to just be lapping it all up. As Louis drew closer, he could see the arrogant smirk twitching Harry Styles’s lips, and the way his dark eyes would light up in the flashes of the camera.

  
Louis ducked his head as he drew near, quickening his steps.

  
Unfortunately, he didn’t make it far before a drawl he recognised all too well caught him on his way. “Ah, if it isn’t the incredibly rude man from the other day.”

  
Louis resisted the urge to flip him off. Instead, he painted a patient smile on his face, and reluctantly looked over at the other man. “I’m presuming you mean me.”

  
“Well, yes.” Harry Styles was looking directly at him, the irritating smirk still present. The others surrounding him drew back a little, staring in awe between him and Louis, but Harry Styles’s gaze never strayed from Louis’s face. “Amazingly enough, I don’t have that many rude people in my life.”

  
“That’s a miracle,” Louis muttered under his breath.

  
Harry Styles arched one perfect brow – probably styled, knowing the sorts of circles he moved in. Or Louis presumed he moved in, anyway. He pushed away from the wall, stepping towards Louis. His motions were lazy, unhurried.

  
Louis subconsciously drew back a step.

  
“I mean, I should probably thank you, really,” Harry Styles drawled.

  
Louis blinked. “Um. Thank me?”

  
“Yeah, it’s not often I get such an _honest_ opinion.” Harry Styles gave a tiny, sweeping gesture to the rest of the crowd, lowering his voice. “I usually just get wild fans like them.”

  
Louis resisted the urge to snort. Of all the _arrogant presumptions_ … Still, Louis managed to keep his face mostly straight, replying in a neutral tone, “How difficult that must be for you.”

  
“Eh,” Harry Styles shrugged, “I get through it.”

  
Louis shook his head, his lips quirking despite himself.

  
“Anyway.” Harry Styles was smirking now, his eyes trained on Louis. “Have you revised your opinion at all, from yesterday?”

  
Louis didn’t sensor his small laugh this time. “I’m not going to compliment you, if that’s what you’re after.”

  
“Shame, that.” Harry Styles shook his head, his expression betraying slight interest. “You recognised me when you saw me, so clearly you must have seen me before.”

  
Louis bit down on his inner cheek. He struggled to keep his voice casual. “Ah. Maybe once.”

  
“Only once? I am surprised.”

  
Louis couldn’t stop his derisive snort this time. “What, are you _that_ amazed that I might not have seen every single thing you’ve ever been in?”

  
“Not exactly,” Harry Styles shrugged, his eyes sparkling, “But it would make you something of a novelty.”

  
Louis resisted the urge to roll his eyes and curse him out on the spot. This was _just_ what he needed – to become a plaything for some arrogant upstart. He turned away from Harry, ignoring the rest of the crowd that had gathered around him.

  
“Leaving so soon?” Harry Styles chuckled.

  
“I’ve got work.”

  
“So have I,” Harry Styles shrugged, glancing over his shoulder at the film set barely visible behind the swirling of the smoke machines. “Probably, anyway.”

  
“Then don’t let me keep you.” Louis spoke through gritted teeth. He strode away as quickly as he could without appearing visibly rude, a cold flood of relief washing over him when Harry Styles didn’t stop him. The small crowd of people parted for Louis, but he was met with a few judgemental looks, and more than one open-mouthed stare.

  
Louis forced himself to remain calm as he strode on down the street.

  
...

  
Later that night, Louis curled up in his empty flat, his sofa cushions arranged just the way he liked them so he had a comfy little corner to curl up in and call his own. He had four textbooks open, each occupying the nearest flat surface he could find (one balanced rather precariously on the back of his sofa), and a mug of steaming coffee in his hand. His laptop was open as he endeavoured to take notes for his PHD, knowing his supervisor would be on his case if he didn’t have this in by the end of the week.

  
Trouble was, with Louis having to walk to his job at the bookstore every day, he had to add on another good two hours to his day. He never thought he’d actually _miss_ the unreliable bus service. Worse, the bloody film set was going to be there for the next five months – which would leave only two months or so until Louis’s PHD was actually finished. This disruption was going to affect him for the foreseeable future.

  
As long as he didn’t run into Harry Styles again, Louis thought he could cope.

  
There were, of course, other routes Louis could take into work, but they all involved a large detour that would add anything between half an hour to two whole hours extra onto his already extended work day, and Louis really couldn’t afford the missed time. Besides, one spoiled brat of an actor wasn’t going to bother Louis that much – he was 26, a proper adult, he didn’t let children affect him anymore.

  
How old even _was_ Harry Styles? With that babyface, was he even in his 20s yet?

  
Louis deliberated for a moment, his fingers poised over his textbooks, before he gave in and grabbed his laptop. He pulled up google and hesitated for just another second before typing in _Harry Styles._

  
Instantly, he was flooded with page after page in the search results. Louis shook his head. No wonder the guy had such an issue with attention – he must be used to getting admired from every angle. Well, Louis wasn’t going to be doing that any time soon.

  
He clicked on a general information page, raising his brows as he scrolled through the facts. Harry Styles was 21 years old, and a bit of a sensation for getting pulled out of his drama academy early to start getting professional work. Since then, he’d been going from star role to star role, gradually making a name for himself, until some of the biggest directors had him on their first-choice list. The current role he’d be playing in _Don't Worry Darling_ looked like it would be his biggest to date, though.

  
Louis pursed his lips, mildly impressed despite himself. He knew a few of the directors mentioned, and he liked and respected their work – so there must be _something_ about Harry Styles if they wanted him. Plus, Louis begrudgingly admitted, he had enjoyed _Kiwi_. He even recalled nearly buying a poster of Alex– which he now thanked all the stars he hadn’t, because how embarrassing would that be to have a poster of Harry Styles on his wall when he knew just how unpleasant the actor was in person.

  
A sound at the door disturbed Louis from his reverie. He settled his laptop carefully on the pile of textbooks, then jumped up to his feet and scurried to the door, opening it to reveal Zayn.  
Louis quirked a brow, stepping aside to let his friend in. “Come back again, have you?”

  
“Yes, but,” Zayn lifted his hands to show a bottle of wine and a couple of pizza boxes, “This time I bring gifts.”

  
Louis’s expression brightened as he waved Zayn in. “Not necessary, but thanks.”

  
“It is necessary!” Zayn declared loudly as he strode in, making himself comfortable on Louis’s sofa. “You saved my life, mate, my boss loved my film.”

  
“Yeah? You showed it to him, then?”

  
“Yep! And get this – he wants to present it to the board.”

  
Louis arched a brow. “Board?”

  
“Yeah, the company board – they decide what films they want to pursue, which projects they support, that kind of thing.”

  
“Oh, I see.” Louis blinked, a smile threatening at the corners of his mouth. “And your boss wants to show them your film?”

  
“Yep!” Zayn’s grin was so huge Louis was worried it would fall off his face.

  
Louis matched the expression, his eyes lighting up. “That’s incredible, Zee, congrats.”

  
“Thanks.” Zayn was practically preening.

  
“I knew you could do it.”

  
“I owe you, though,” Zayn added seriously. “If you hadn’t edited it so quickly, there’s no way it would have been done on time.”

  
Louis waved him away, grabbing for one of the pizza boxes. “No worries. Just maybe back up your files next time.”

  
Zayn nodded fervently in agreement.

  
They settled into Louis’s sofa, sticking on an old favourite TV show to watch as they chatted and munched on pizza together. After sharing a freshly rolled joint, Louis could feel himself properly relaxing for the first time in what felt like too long. Zayn was the best friend Louis had ever made, and time with him was difficult to come by these days. Louis often longed for their undergraduate days, when they were careless students flying through their degrees, spending more time lounging on each other’s bedroom floors than actually sitting in lectures.

  
But adulthood caught up with them all eventually, and with Louis’s PHD and Zayn's demanding job, they didn’t see each other too much anymore. Louis missed evenings like these – fully relaxed, laughing in each other’s company.

  
Later in the evening, Zayn nudged Louis’s laptop with his foot, making the screen light up. He raised his eyebrows when he saw the search page still up from earlier. “ _Harry Styles?_ Really?”

  
Louis shrugged, weirdly embarrassed. “Was just looking some stuff up. Y’know, seeing as everyone’s so excited about him being here.”

  
“And? You impressed?”

  
“Eh.” Louis shrugged, his tone diffident. “He’s been in some good titles, I guess.”

  
Zayn snorted. “Too right he has. He’s got good taste.”

  
“Maybe if he wasn’t such a dick,” Louis muttered.

  
Zayn sent him a questioning glance.

  
Louis looked back, scratching the back of his head. “Nothing.”

  
“…If you say so.” Zayn turned back to the laptop screen, scrolling through some of the titles. “Oh, look, he’s in _Unlucky in Love_! I want to see that.”

  
Louis narrowed his eyes a little. “What’s that?”

  
“New film, it’s out next week.”

  
Louis grimaced. Sounded like any other trashy romcom by the title, and while Louis wasn’t against a bit of romance, he was against big film companies turning out terrible, same-ish films with boring, bland actors churning out the same old lines.

  
“I’m really itching to see it,” Zayn added.

  
Louis’s eyes narrowed. He _knew_ that tone. And sure enough, when he turned his head he saw Zayn sending him a wide-eyed, persuasive stare.

  
Louis glared. “No way.”

  
“Oh, come on!” Zayn’s tone turned whiny.

  
“No.”

  
“I can’t go by myself,” Zayn grumbled, “And you’re the only friend who lets me rant about directing the whole way through.”

  
Louis continued to glare, but he could feel his resilience crumbling. It only took Zayn a couple more minutes of relentless staring for Louis to throw his hands up and agree. “Alright. Fine. But you owe me. _Again_.”

  
Zayn waved a hand, and snatched the joint back from Louis, a grin plastered on his face. “Add it to the list.”

...

  
For the next few days, Louis was glad to say that his walk to work did not involve any more meetings with the arrogant upstart that was Harry Styles. His days were mostly uneventful, in fact. Liam kept him quietly busy at the bookshop, and the relative peace and comfort that came from being around old books helped Louis settle down. He was still annoyed at his lengthy walk to and from work, but he’d grown up enough to recognise that maybe hating an entire film crew just because of that wasn’t the most mature thing to do.

  
One evening, Louis locked up the bookstore – Liam already went home – and slid his keys into his pocket, beginning to make his way through the familiar streets. Doncaster at night was one of Louis’s favourite sights, and especially at this time of year. The air was just beginning to warm up, the first few hints of spring hovering on the horizon. Frost still lay on the ground, but the beginnings of shoots just dared to peek up, adding sprigs of pleasant green to the otherwise grey cityscape.

  
Louis’s steps were unhurried as he made his way home. The evening was already far gone enough that he knew there’d be no point working on his PHD when he got back, so tonight was entirely his, to do with as he liked. He almost dawdled through the streets. The city was still much quieter than he was used to, what with most of the roads being closed, and there were only a few other people out along with Louis himself.

  
That was, until Harry Styles met him again.

  
Louis almost cursed aloud when he saw the irritatingly familiar figure leaning against the wall by the ROAD CLOSED sign. Unfortunately, Harry Styles had already seen him, and was smirking right in his direction by the time Louis looked up. So there was no chance he could just put his head down and barrel on past.

  
No, Louis had to at least attempt to be polite. Even if it was the last thing in the entire universe he wanted to do.

  
“Back again, I see,” Harry Styles spoke in his slow drawl as soon as Louis was within earshot.

  
Louis didn’t even bother faking a smile today. Instead, he just replied with a tired glance. “I have to walk this way.”

  
“And here I thought you were coming to see me again.”

  
“You wish,” Louis shook his head. He attempted to walk past as smoothly as possible, relieved that there were no squealing fangirls around at this time of night.

  
“Wait.”

  
Harry Styles’s voice cracked through the air between them, stopping Louis short. Slowly, he turned back around, and Harry Styles had pushed away from the wall, standing tall in the centre of the street. His warm green eyes were fixed straight on Louis, and his expression was almost … curious? “I want to talk to you.”

  
Louis gave a slow, deliberate blink.  
 _Harry Styles wanted to talk to him? Just what had his life become?_

“Come on,” Harry Styles held his hands up, his expression soft and open. “We haven’t had an actual conversation yet, after all.”

  
Well, Louis supposed he had a point there. He shifted on his feet, releasing a slow breath before he jerked his head in a cautious nod. Getting to know each other better couldn’t end badly, could it?

  
Harry Styles smiled at him. “Good. Hi. I’m Harry.”

  
He held out a hand, which Louis carefully took, still eyeing Harry warily. “I’m Louis.”

  
“Hi, Louis.” Harry shook his hand once before dropping it again, his dark eyes still fixed on Louis’s face. A cold silence settled between them – not exactly uncomfortable, but not exactly easy either. Louis shifted on his feet a little, wondering just what exactly Harry wanted from him.

Well, Louis couldn’t miss this opportunity while he had it.  
“Look,” Louis began slowly, “I’m sorry for the way we met. Honestly.”

  
Harry lifted one brow.

  
“If I’d known who you were – well, I still would have thought what I said, but I wouldn’t have put it so bluntly,” Louis added lamely.

  
Harry gave a quiet snort. “I think I’m almost more offended.”

  
Louis winced. “Yeah. Sorry. I’m not – I'm in kind of a bitchy mood recently.”

  
“I’m picking up on that.” Much to Louis’s surprise, Harry’s tone was riddled with amusement. In the streetlights his face was illuminated, and his hair was styled some weird way – he was in costume, Louis realised slowly – and it made him look more like Alex, from _Kiwi_. He was softer, somehow. More relaxed.

  
“Anyway,” Harry continued, and even his voice was quieter. “I actually didn’t want to talk about you apologising. Though that’s a nice bonus.”

  
Louis immediately retracted any thoughts he had that Harry Styles might be a nice person.

  
“My question is,” Harry added with a slight smirk, “What brings you this way every day, if you clearly hate my film set so much?”

  
Louis snorted. “ _Your_ film set. Yeah, right.”

  
“Excuse me?”

  
“Just like an actor.” Louis shook his head, and maybe it was too late, or maybe he was just too tired to deal with spoiled brats right then, but he seemed to have lost his politeness filter again. “Pretty sure the director and crew are the ones that own the set.”

  
Harry’s eyes narrowed. “And what exactly would you know about it?”

  
“More than you’d think,” Louis muttered.

  
“Oh?” Harry’s voice had turned into a shard of ice. “Because newsflash, being a film nerd doesn’t make you an expert on the industry. My industry.”

  
Louis bit his tongue before he could retaliate and do more damage than he probably already had. Harry Styles didn’t know that Louis knew anything about film. He didn’t need to know. And besides, Louis begrudgingly admitted, he didn’t know much of what went on in a professional set, much as he’d love to.

  
But, as an editor, and seeing Zayn struggling to make it as a director, Louis had some idea of just how difficult being a crew member on a big film could be.

  
“With all due respect,” Louis managed, his tone clipped, “I’m exhausted, and I want to go home. So if you’ll excuse me…”

  
Harry stepped aside, his eyes glittering. “Easily. Clearly you’re always rude – I thought maybe I just caught you on a bad day at first.”

  
Louis stopped short, his eyes narrowing.

  
“My followers must have been right,” Harry added.

  
“Wait.” Louis span back around. “Followers?”

  
“Yeah. They’ve been telling me you’re a rude arsehole.” Harry ran his eyes slowly down Louis’s body, and despite himself, Louis shivered. “Clearly I should have listened.”

  
Before Louis could get himself together enough to close his mouth and think up some witty retort, Harry sent him one more smirk before wheeling around and disappearing back onto the film set.

  
Louis watched him go with something odd sitting in the base of his stomach. The cold night air that seemed so fresh before now bit at his shoulders, his thin jacket not doing much to keep the freezing night off him. Louis felt strangely hollow as he directed his steps back home.

  
But Harry Styles was a bastard. Louis didn’t care about what he thought.

  
Still, the news about Harry’s followers did bug Louis quite a bit. So much so that once he was curled up in bed that night, his miserable microwaved meal sitting uncomfortably in his stomach, he gave in and opened up twitter.

  
Harry Styles was one of the first results to pop up. Louis raised his brows when he saw the many millions of followers that Harry had accumulated – though he supposed he shouldn’t be surprised, the guy was young and apparently attractive and clearly knew his way around the internet. Louis’s brow furrowed as he scrolled through some of his tweets. Mostly just typical dull day-to-day tweets of his morning coffee or a sneak peek of the film set. There were also an abundant number of selfies, to which Louis rolled his eyes.

  
But there, from a few days ago, sat one tweet that caught Louis’s eye.

  
_@harry_styles: just met the RUDEST man. Apparently our film set 'got in his way'. Did the cameras and smoke machines not give it away?! #irritatingstranger_

  
Despite himself, Louis felt his stomach clench a little. Had he really made that much of an impression from their one brief meeting? Sure, Louis made an idiot of himself, which wasn’t uncommon, but he didn’t usually get to see the results of his idiocy plastered all across the internet.

  
There were literally hundreds of replies to the tweet, as well, some of which Harry had responded to.

  
_@HAL0HARRY: @harry_styles srsly rude does he not know you’re in the best film ever?_

  
_@harry_styles: @HAL0HARRY apparently not :P He also doesn’t rate any of us actors in it. Thinks we’re trash._

  
_@kiwistyles: @harry_styles he doesn’t have a clue what he’s talking about king ur the best don’t listen_

  
_@harry_styles: @kiwistyles thanksss xxx_

  
_@Harryslittleangel: @harry_styles Harry was he cute at least_

  
_@harry_styles: @Harryslittleangel maybe an 8_

  
Louis dropped his phone like it was made of blue flames.

  
 _Maybe an 8?_ The hell did that mean? A mixture of irritation and confusion settled in Louis’s stomach, along with a tinge of something far too warm for his liking. Harry Styles was straight, wasn’t he? Louis was sure he’d seen a few nonsense articles waffling on about how Harry was going on dates with fellow actresses. In fact, hadn’t he been with his co-star from _Kiwi_? Olivia whats-her-face?

  
So what on earth was he doing complimenting Louis on twitter?

  
If that’s what he was doing. Which he most likely wasn’t. Louis sternly reminded himself that he was a little dot in the sea of the world, meaningless, floating along without really having too wide an effect. Not like Harry Styles. No, Harry Styles was a freaking manta ray, causing endless ripples.

  
He had nothing to do with Louis Tomlinson.

  
Maybe Louis had underestimated just how bad this situation actually was. Louis just thought he was having to deal with an annoyance sometimes on his walk to work, if Harry Styles happened to be there greeting his fans and seemed to be incapable of letting Louis walk past without sending some sly remark his way. But that was as far as Louis thought it went. Some annoying, irritable conversing, and the odd glare between two strangers; that was all.

  
But apparently not.

  
Louis didn’t take into consideration the huge number of people Harry had on his side. Nor did Louis think for a second that Harry would actually talk about him on his social media. The army of Harry’s fans (that he apparently had) would no doubt be after Louis’s blood if they knew who he was. At least Harry had the sense to leave his name out of it (unless that was just down to the character limit, in which case Louis needed to send a thank-you letter to Twitter ASAP).

  
Either way, apparently, Louis’s actions had much further-reaching consequences than he’d considered.

  
Gnawing on his lip, Louis hesitated for a moment before clicking on the ‘ _follow_ ’ button next to Harry’s name. He was sure he’d get lost in the sea of new followers Harry must get every day, but Louis decided he needed to be kept up to date with what Harry was posting, in case any of it mentioned him again. Louis rarely used twitter, only occasionally tweeting something about his day or networking with other film editors, but it was a vaguely useful thing to have. If it let him keep up with Harry, then that was a bonus.

  
Not that Louis cared what he was doing. It would just be easier to keep track of their awkward, irritating encounters. Maybe Louis should try being a little more tactful next time, though.

  
He rolled over, switching apps on his phone to watch some videos for a while before he settled enough to get to sleep. He was halfway through the highlight reel of last night's football match when a notification lit up the top of the screen with a new tweet from – of all people – Harry.

  
_@harry_styles: Incredibly Rude Man was back. Still not impressed with the film. We’ll just have to prove him wrong, won’t we?_

  
There were already countless replies flooding in by the time Louis had tapped on the tweet. Reams and reams of support for Harry were flying in from every angle, along with a few less-than-pleasant comments about the man he was referring to.

  
Louis had no doubt the tweet was about him.

  
Even as the thought crossed his mind, Louis could feel anger beginning to simmer away in his stomach. It wasn’t like Harry was a perfect princess, either! He was less than civil to Louis, with his arrogant presumptions and stupid smirk and irritating ability to always be in the way at the worst possible time. Yet he still had all these fans clamouring over his every word, without knowing any of the actual details. None of them had probably even met Harry, in all his arrogant, irritating glory.

  
Louis hit the reply button before he was fully aware of what he was doing, angrily typing.

  
_@ltw91: @harry_styles you sure you’re telling the truth? I hear Incredibly Rude Man was just trying to get home when you assaulted him_

  
Louis paused before replying, deliberating, trying to talk himself down. Getting embroiled in some kind of public war with an infamous actor was really not going to help him, or his career, and it was frankly childish. Louis should just delete the tweet, get some sleep, and start fresh in the morning.

  
Except the flood of replies in support of Harry kept coming through, and Harry kept replying to them with endless kisses and insincere ‘thank you’s, and Louis just couldn’t let it slide.  
He posted the tweet.

  
As soon as it was done, Louis clicked off the app and shoved his phone under his pillow, breathing heavily. He regretted it as soon as the tweet went through. He didn’t do this kind of thing – as a rule, Louis didn’t really like attracting attention to himself, especially negative attention. He was always happy behind-the-scenes, working on his editing, occasionally filming something for Zayn if he needed a hand. Louis did not make public scenes.

He just didn’t.

  
But he was angry, and Harry Styles was an annoying twat, and it was too late at night for this kind of nonsense.

  
Louis lay still until the constant churning of his thoughts became unbearable and he grabbed for his phone again, clicking back onto the football highlights. Football would help him forget what an idiotic mess he was making out of his real life. Besides, his reply was going to get lost in the hundreds upon thousands of tweets Harry Styles must get daily. There was no reason he’d see the one from Louis. And even if he did, he wouldn’t know it was Louis. Not necessarily.

  
Right?

  
Louis only made it through a few more minutes before a new twitter notification came through.

  
_@harry_styles: @lwt91 really depends on your opinion. personally I thought I was being quite charming_

  
Ok, but Louis really could not resist replying to that. Was this guy even for real?

  
_@lwt91: @harry_styles If you call standing in the middle of the street and smirking ‘charming’_

  
The reply from Harry came just an instant later, and Louis had to pause, wondering for a second if any of this was even real.

  
 _Harry Styles was tweeting him._ What?

  
_@harry_styles: @lwt91 I do. And you should too if you know what’s good for you :P_

  
Louis stared. So apparently they were at emoji level now? Was that really something that happened if you got into public fights with famous actors?  
Apparently so.

  
As Louis stared at the reply in something a little too close to shock, his notifications began blowing up, tweets firing at an alarming rate until he feared the app would actually crash.

  
_@Stylessfam: @harry_styles @lwt91 harry is this really the guy?!_

  
_@lilystylesxx: @harry_styles @lwt91 omg now way theres live Incredibly Rude Man drama rn_

  
_@kiwiharry: @harry_styles @lwt91 HARRY TWEETED YOU ASFDSHKLS IM NOT BREATHING HARRY TWEET ME NEXT KING_

  
Louis stared at the flood until his fears were realised and the app actually did crash, apparently unable to cope with the sudden influx of impossibly quick fans. They must hang off Harry’s every tweet. No wonder the guy had such a thing about attention. He shoved his phone back under his pillow, giving up on the football highlights and instead tugging his bedcovers up over his head.

  
It wouldn’t take long for twitter to forget about this, would it? Louis would soon be buried among the rest of Harry Styles’s countless replies, hidden by the endless streams of selfies and fanservice. He’d be safe again soon.

No one would even remember this happening.

  
Right?

  
Louis went to sleep that night with a troubled frown coating his features and a heavy feeling of dread sitting low in his gut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sooo... what did you guys think?? 
> 
> don't forget to comment and leave kudos <3


	3. III

Predictably, the internet didn’t forget about Louis’s tweet.

He woke the next day to such a giant flood of Twitter notifications that he had to remove the app from his phone because the numerous messages made it crash repeatedly. He checked the messages on his laptop, curiosity getting the better of him, but he only made it through the first thirty or so before he got tired of the endless fangirl squealing and few hate comments directed his way. Apparently, some people still wanted to berate him for daring to criticise their favourite actor.

Harry Styles remained conspicuously silent about the whole thing.

 _‘Must be normal for him,’_ Louis thought savagely as he shoved his laptop away. Personally, he hated getting involved in any sort of drama, and he was already seriously regretting tweeting Harry back in the first place. He decided it would be better if he just left it alone.

He just couldn’t stand the thought of not defending himself. Harry was the one at fault here. He was the one publicly stirring everyone up. Not Louis.

None of this was Louis’s fault.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Louis’s follower count was steadily increasing as well, so maybe that would actually do his business some good. Not that Louis was proud. His stomach soured at the thought of gaining success thanks to someone like _Harry Styles._

Thankfully, it was the weekend, which meant Louis had no shifts at the bookshop. Instead, he was going to use the day to get caught up with some of his PhD work, which meant he could laze around in his sweats and never go outside if that’s what he wanted.

In other words, a perfect day.

Louis was just settling down with his textbooks when his phone buzzed. Fearing that Twitter had come back to haunt him, Louis considered ignoring it, but then it buzzed again and he scooped it up to see a text from Zayn.

**_Z:_ ** _hey so unlucky in love comes out tonight, meet me at 7?_

Louis grimaced. The _last_ thing he needed was more Harry in his life, even in the form of a character in a new film. In fact, all he really wanted was to curl up in his room and hide until real life and work forced him back into the outside world.

As if reading his mind, another text came through thirty seconds later.

**_Z:_ ** _I know you won’t want to but you promised, remember?_

Louis grimaced. He knew making any kind of promise to Zayn was a bad idea—it always ended with him being forced into situations he’d much rather avoid—but a promise was a promise, and Zayn was the closest thing to a best friend Louis had ever had. He needed to keep their friendship up, and even Zayn wouldn’t take someone who just hid in their room every single time he tried to arrange something.

So, groaning, Louis dragged himself into his bedroom to put on some proper clothes.

...

The night was a cold and gloomy one—one of the last such of the year, with spring just peeking its nose around the corner. The stony pavements rang with footsteps, the sky clear, the moon shining brightly. Louis considered this to be the perfect night for a walk, for being outside, for enjoying the beauty of Doncaster from its quiet, night-time outskirts.

Not so much for going to a busy film screening in the very centre of the city.

Louis leaned against the wall of the cinema, arms folded and gaze fixed on the floor by his feet. The screening looked to be a popular one, with crowds of people milling around outside the cinema’s busy entrance. Louis did his best to avoid them all. The noise rattled in his skull, but he did his best to melt into the background. Not the easiest thing to do when he was six-foot-two and stood out like a sore thumb, but still.

“Well,” a voice called just to Louis’s right, “I didn’t expect to see _you_ here.”

Louis cursed inside his head.

That voice. That stupid, irritating, obnoxious voice cut through the sharp air like a knife through butter, and Louis cursed his luck. Could he really, _really_ , not manage to go even a few days without seeing the arrogant face of Harry Styles?

With a long-suffering sigh, Louis opened his eyes and looked to his right and there, sure enough, stood Harry. Louis all but groaned aloud. “What are _you_ doing here?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” There was a hint of a chuckle in Harry’s tone as he leaned against the wall next to Louis. “Thought you hated any film I’m in.”

Louis shifted just a little away. “I never said that.”

“No,” Harry agreed mildly, “But I’m pretty sure you called me a lame actor chosen for my pretty face. Right?”

Louis grimaced. “Um. Sorry?”

“Don’t be, I always appreciate honesty. And at least you called me pretty.”

Louis’s face screwed up further. “I wouldn’t know.”

“Oh come on, no need to be coy.” Harry chuckled, his tone a low drawl.

Louis turned his face away deliberately, trying his best to ignore the tall, lurking figure by his side. Harry’s arrogance was not attractive in the slightest. Not at _all._ Louis scowled at the ground, his fingers digging into his arms as he spoke again. “Why are _you_ here, anyway?”

“Is a man not allowed to enjoy a night out?”

“But you’re _in_ this film,” Louis pointed out, “Why on earth would you come see it?”

Harry chuckled, his warm emerald eyes dancing at Louis. “Why not? This way I know it’s good.”

Louis lifted his eyes heavenward. “I should have known better than to get a decent answer from you.”

“You’re learning quickly, I see.” Harry was truly smirking by now.

Louis deliberately looked away. Harry’s presence was setting Louis on edge, as it always seemed to. He could already feel his stomach tying itself up into an angry little knot, his mind helpfully throwing any good insults he knew his way. But Louis should at least _try_ and be civil. He’d done enough damage on Twitter last night.

“Besides,” Harry continued quietly after a few minutes, “This is one of the best places for me to hide.”

Louis sent him a questioning look, and his breath was stolen away slightly by what he saw. Harry was glancing down at the pavement, his expression pensive. He was still leaning up against the wall. His presence was warm beside Louis.

“No one looks for me here,” Harry explained with a wry smirk. “No one thinks I’d be arrogant enough to show up at my own film screening.”

Louis allowed himself a smile in return. “Well, clearly they don’t know you very well.”

“Hey. I think you just offended me. For about the twelfth time.” Harry shook his head. “Quite a talent, seeing as we’ve only met, like, twice.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You really _are_ an arsehole.”

“Not normally,” Louis replied honestly. “You just seem to have a habit of bringing it out in me.”

Harry sent him a lingering look at that. Louis squirmed a little uncomfortably against the wall, only holding his gaze for a few moments before dropping his eyes back down to look at the floor.

“Well,” Harry said softly, “Maybe we’ll just have to change that soon.”

Louis glanced back up again, quirking a brow. ‘ _Sure.’_ Somehow, he doubted there would ever be a time he was happy to talk to such an arrogant, selfish prick, but Louis supposed he shouldn’t rule anything out. And Harry was sending him quite a nice smile.

Then, of course, he had to go and ruin it.

“My Twitter followers still hate you, of course,” Harry added with an airy wave of his hand.

Louis’s eyes narrowed. “And you always listen to people on the internet?”

“At least they aren’t downright rude to my face.”

“No, they just flaunt compliments at you to get your attention,” Louis spat back sarcastically.

Harry’s brows drew tight. “And you have a problem with that?”

“ _No_.” Louis blew a breath out, slowly, keeping a tight rein on his temper. He didn’t understand what had got into him – usually, it took a lot more to get him this irritated. Somehow, Harry just seemed to push all his buttons.

Just at that moment, thankfully, footsteps sounded to Louis’s left and Zayn’s familiar voice sounded, slightly breathless. “Hey! Sorry I’m a bit late.”

“No worries.” Louis sent one more glare Harry’s way before pointedly turning his back, facing Zayn instead.

Zayn glanced between Louis and Harry, one brow arching. He looked up at Harry properly, and quickly drew back, his eyes widening. “Wait. Is that…?”

“He’s no one,” Louis quickly cut in, grabbing Zayn’s arm and beginning to drag him away. Zayn’s arm immediately wrapped around Louis instinctively.

“Louis, that’s—”

“Not important.”

Zayn quickly stopped Louis and spun them around. “Louis—that’s _Harry Styles!_ ”

Louis closed his eyes. He held back a long-suffering sigh.

“Lou!” Zayn’s voice was an airy mixture of confused and excited. “Why didn’t you tell me you know him‽”

Louis grimaced, opening his eyes to fix Zayn with a stern look. Unfortunately, the worst of Louis’s fears were confirmed. It was more than evident from Zayn grin that he couldn’t have been more thrilled with this turn of events. He leaned away from Louis, instead turning back to glance up at Harry Styles. “You’re Harry Styles right?”

“Yes,” Harry responded dryly, “But I’d rather you didn’t shout it out. Kinda trying to be inconspicuous here.”

“Oh, sorry mate!” Zayn instantly lowered his voice. He held out a hand for Harry to shake, unable to hold back his wide smile. “Just excited to see you. Been a fan of your work for a while!”

“Nice to meet you, uh…?”

“Zayn.”

“Zayn.” Harry shook his hand with a quick glace in Louis’s direction. “It’s nice to meet someone who has a normal reaction to me.”

“Oh, for _God’s_ sake,” Louis muttered under his breath. “Could you _get_ any more arrogant?”

Harry merely grinned at him.

Zayn sent a slightly confused look to Louis. The tension was obvious between them, sitting thick enough to cut. Zayn gave a surprised laugh, swinging his arm around Louis’ waist again. “Has Louis not been civil?”

“Anything but,” Harry cut in with a smirk, his eyes quickly glancing down to Zayn’s arm wrapped around Louis. “You know he told me that I only got cast for my good looks?”

“Hey!” Louis cut in quickly. “In my defence, I didn’t know who you were then.”

“Yeah, but then you said you would have said the same thing anyway.”

“Louis!” Zayn glanced at him with a shocked expression, although his eyes showed signs of laughter too.

Louis fidgeted. It wasn’t _his_ fault Harry seemed to bring out his frustrations during every conversation.

“Anyway,” Harry pointedly moved towards the door, sending them both a final smile, “My film’s about to start. You should come in, if you’re going to watch it.”

“Of course.” Zayn replied. “And don’t worry, I’m going to force Louis to compliment you after this.”

“Don’t you dare,” Louis hissed into his ear. He could already picture Harry’s smug, arrogant expression, hear his stupid obnoxious laughter. There was no way Louis would ever give him the satisfaction.

“Just kidding Lou, calm down” Zayn snickered in his ear, quirking a brow at him.

Harry gave both of them another final, tight lipped smile before walking straight towards the entrance of the theatre.

Louis and Zayn paused at the ticket machine, putting a bit of distance between themselves and Harry.

“So, what’s the story there?” Zayn asked, his head jerking towards the direction of Harry.

Louis shifted uncomfortably. “I dunno Zee. He caught me at a bad time, I guess.”

Zayn shook his head, his lips twitching. “Whatever you say. Just behave yourself tonight, ok? It won’t exactly help my career—or yours—if we make an enemy of one of the best actors around.”

“He can’t be _that_ good,” Louis muttered sullenly.

Zayn just laughed at him.

They queued up for their tickets, joining the group of people keen to see the newest release, and Louis had to begrudgingly admit that maybe he was being a bit childish about this whole thing. He’d _loved_ Harry Styles’s character in _Kiwi._ The guy was a good actor, whatever he might be like in person. And Zayn had a point—Louis should be thinking practically here, thinking about how good it could be for his career if he got Harry Styles on his good side.

The thought still made Louis’s stomach sour, though. He just couldn’t abide the idea of using someone else to get for success. Especially someone like _that_.

They got their tickets and moved through to the theatre, and much to Louis’s distress, their seats were right in front of Harry. While Zayn hurried towards their row, Louis hung back for a long as he could. _Was there no way he could escape this stupid, arrogant bastard?_ He didn’t want to be here in the first place—he really wasn’t sure how well he’d be able to cope with sitting through two hours of Harry, both on the screen _and_ in real life.

But Zayn was already waving him over, and Louis didn’t actually want to lose his best friend, so he moved reluctantly over to the row, plastering something like a smile onto his face.

“Hey,” Zayn leaned over and whispered in his ear once they both were seated, “Thanks for coming tonight, by the way.”

“You’d better be grateful,” Louis muttered back to him.

The lights were still bright, the trailers yet to start, and a quiet hum of chatter settled through the theatre. The smell and crunch of popcorn echoed from most seats, almost every seat already taken. Clearly, this was going to be a popular release.

Zayn turned behind them, smiling at Harry. “So, do you ever get nervous before watching these?”

“Nah never,” Harry answered breezily. “I’m perfectly fine with seeing my face plastered all over a giant screen.”

Zayn chuckled, and Louis let out a loud snort. Honestly, he couldn’t even tell if the idiot was being sarcastic or not. Harry was wearing a fuzzy hat, pulled low over his face, and he was in a simple hoody with jeans – the most casual Louis had ever seen him.

Harry caught Louis’s stare and quirked a brow. “I hope you will actually watch this.”

“What’s it to you either way?” Louis countered.

Harry leaned back with a light shrug. “Nothing in particular. Just, it’s a good film. Whether or not you like me, you should give it a shot.”

Zayn sent him an appraising look. Louis sighed, giving a half-shrug. “Honestly, it’s not really my thing, but I’ll give it a chance.”

“Of course you will,” ZAYN agreed. “Just geek about the editing, you can probably use it for your thesis.”

“Maybe.”

At these words, Harry perked back up again. He looked questioningly between Zayn and Louis. “Thesis?”

“For his PhD,” Zayn explained, completely ignoring Louis’s suddenly horrified look. “He’s a film student – did he not tell you?”

“No.” Harry’s emerald eyes were suddenly fixed right on Louis again, pinning him in place. “No, he didn’t.”

Louis gulped. He wanted to look away, but something about Harry Styles’ gaze—so sincere, weirdly calm, and entirely different from his normal persona—kept him in place. Strangely, Louis was nervous. Now that Harry knew what he did, would his opinion of Louis change at all? He’d probably just hate him more. Harry was an actor—why would he give two shits about the people working behind the scenes? Especially not with his arrogance.

And yet, something in Harry’s expression made Louis reconsider everything he’d learned about the young actor so far.

The lights started to dim, plunging the theatre into blackness, and Louis finally broke their gaze. He turned back to face the front with an odd, slightly uncomfortable feeling sitting in his stomach—something oddly close to nerves.

But that was ridiculous. There was absolutely nothing to be nervous about.

Louis curled his fingers into his sides, playing with the hem of his shirt as he stared up at the screen. As the adverts went on, Louis found himself wishing he could see Harry, rather than be stuck in front of him. It would be interesting to watch his reactions to this film, to see how he really looked when he was watching himself on a screen.

Instead, Harry would get the pleasure of watching Louis’s reactions.

Louis made a mental note to keep his face smooth as the main feature began to play.

\---

The film, Louis begrudgingly admitted, was actually pretty good.

Yes, it was a typical rom-com. Yes, it had all the usual tropes that didn’t stand up to further scrutiny, and a plot hole so big an elephant could walk through it, but despite all that, the film was charming and funny and full of warmth. Louis already knew it was exactly the sort of film Zayn loved. It was clever, and quirky, and the actors were good at portraying chemistry _(and yes, that included Harry, who had been charming and rather adorable as the main male lead)._

Not that Louis would ever admit that out loud.

Unfortunately, as soon as the credits began to role, an irritatingly familiar dry voice spoke in Louis’s ear. “So? What did you think?”

Louis almost leaped out of his skin.

He turned, slowly, and saw Harry with a little knowing smirk tugging at his lips, his eyes fixed straight on Louis. That sparked anger in Louis’s stomach, but he pushed the thought away. Instead, he lifted a finger. “Alright, alright, I’ll admit. It was good.”

Harry let out a quiet cheer.

“ _But_ ,” Louis was quick to add, “You have to ignore the plot hole, and the totally unnecessary fanservice…”

“Excuse me?”

“…But other than that, it is a decent film.”

“What unnecessary fanservice?” Harry huffed.

Louis just raised a brow. The film was full of the usual rom-com ‘moments’, but the kiss scene was really unnecessarily long, and there was a shower scene that was definitely just there for the image. Not that Louis minded seeing a wet and naked Harry Styles for a good few minutes. Just thinking back to it made him flustered.

Luckily, Zayn came to his rescue, spinning around to send Harry a grin, enthusiastically chattering away about how much he loved the film. Harry looked suitably flattered, responding with the odd witty sarcasm. More often than not, though, he flicked his gaze to Louis.

The crowds slowly filtered out of the theatre, until it was quiet enough to hear the crinkling of crisp packets on the floor being stepped on. Louis got to his feet, giving Zayn’s arm a small tug. “C’mon. Let’s go, I’ve got work in the morning.”

Zayn made a sympathetic noise. “Aww poor Lou.”

“It would be fine,” Louis shot a pointed glance at Harry, “If it wasn’t for a certain film set making my journey an hour longer.”

Harry snickered. He lifted both his hands, palm-out. “Don’t blame me. I didn’t make the filming happen here.”

“Why did they pick Doncaster anyway?” Zayn wondered aloud as they moved towards the exit.

Harry gave a small shrug. “Wasn’t my decision. I have no idea.”

Louis rolled his eyes. He shouldn’t be surprised, really. Of course an actor wouldn’t know anything beyond the superficial, boring information. If Zayn wanted details, he was going to have to get on the set.

Knowing him, though, he’d probably try.

“Well, I’m glad it’s here,” Zayn added with a small smile. “Makes things more exciting, right?”

“I could do without it,” Louis muttered.

ZAYN shot him a look, his brows lifted. Louis made a face back at him. “Alright, Zee, we didn’t all fangirl when we saw it was coming here.”

Zayn glared at Louis.

Harry gave a small chuckle, lifting an interested brow. “Ahh so you’re of a fan, then?”

“No!” Zayn grimaced. “I mean, I’m trying to get into directing, but there isn’t usually much of a scene around here.”

Harry’s eyes brightened with interest. Much to Louis’s surprise, he actually asked Zayn for more details, wanting to know which company he was working for. Zayn, of course, was more than happy to supply the details, and Louis found himself distancing himself from the conversation as they walked through the streets of Doncaster. Harry was still wearing his hat, pulled low over his face, and in his casual attire no one had recognised him so far. Even with his giant-like height, he managed to be inconspicuous.

Louis wondered quite how he managed that. After all, his face would stand out among a crowd. It was pleasing. And he’d looked really adorable in the film. The character he was playing was a teen, which helped, but Harry brought this raw kind of innocence to the role that made Louis’s chest ache weirdly.

Shame the real thing was such an arrogant mess.

An arrogant mess that was talking to him.

“So, you do editing?” Harry slowed a little, causing Louis to catch up in the conversation, “And your… _friend_ does directing?”

Louis slid his thumbs into his pockets and nodded.

“Seems like a dream team.”

“Yeah, Zayn’s my better half,” Louis responded with a small smile. “There’s not much opportunity around here though, but we try.”

“It’s pretty cool though.” Harry’s eyes were bright as he fixed Louis with a curious gaze. “So, I guess you _do_ know something about the industry, huh?”

Louis shrugged, biting his inner cheek to hold back a smile. “Maybe a little.”

Harry matched his expression, biting back a smirk. “Just clearly not enough to know a good actor when you see one. I’ll see you around.” He lifted a hand in farewell and turned, heading down a different street.

Louis watched him go, outraged. “Excuse _you_! My taste is perfect, thank you very much!”

He swore he heard ghostly chuckles echoing from Harry’s retreating back.

That _bastard._ Louis cursed internally, turning away with a frown decorating his features. Just when he was beginning to think that Harry was maybe vaguely human, he had to go and ruin it all again. Could he even hear himself? Louis shook his head, his stomach tightening.

Zayn walked by his side with a small chuckle. “So. I take it you don’t like him?”

“Have you even _heard_ him?”

ZAYN laughed aloud. “Well, you know, you _do_ rile him up.”

Louis sent him a shocked look. “What?”

“You know,” Zayn’s eyes were twinkling, “You’re always grumbling at him, or glaring at him, or—”

“I am not!”

“I saw you, mate,” ZAYN snickered, clapping a hand on Louis’s shoulder.

Louis grimaced as they continued through the streets. The air was bitingly cold, gripping his fingers even when he shoved them inside his pockets. Frost whitened the pavement, the night quiet aside from a few blaring traffic horns from deeper in the city. The sky was hidden in a misty haze from the lights, but a few stars just struggled to make themselves known in the clear, cloudless sky.

“You have to admit, though,” Zayn added, “The film was pretty great.”

Louis begrudgingly agreed. Whatever else he might be, Harry Styles was a decent actor. As they continued on, Louis let Zayn chatter on about the directing, and the camera angles, and whatever else about the film he’d loved so much (and okay, yes, maybe Louis agreed that the director was clearly a genius and the plot had been charming, if predictable).

But Louis definitely had _not_ liked it. That much.

And he hadn’t had a good time either.

Nope. Definitely not.


	4. IV

A few days passed before Louis saw Harry Styles again.

Work continued, as it always would, and Louis spent his time either shifting books at the shop with Liam, hanging with Zayn, or lying among his textbooks trying to ignore the ever-building pressure that he really should probably have begun writing his thesis by now. He’d already got through his undergrad and his masters, but a PhD was another step up, and Louis was finding his brain fried itself whenever he tried to pull his thoughts together and get them down on paper.

On the plus side, no more annoying interactions had woven their way into his mornings.

Louis’s Twitter account still occasionally blew up, with some people bugging him about whether or not he really _had_ met Harry Styles. Louis had to admire the dedication of some of Harry’s fans. More than once, Louis had been asked what Harry smelled like, and someone even requested the exact measurement of his fingers. Louis ignored them all, deleting them as soon as they arrived in his inbox. He’d learned his lesson about getting embroiled in Twitter fights.

Zayn had noticed the tweets, and left Louis a laughing voicemail questioning his sanity. Why was he getting involved in Twitter fights with Harry if he didn’t even like the guy? Louis had to admit, he was questioning his own sanity as well. He blamed it on his tiredness and irritation that Harry was publicly lying about him.

Well, maybe lying was a strong word. Misleading? Misleading.

Louis shook away the thoughts as he stirred his morning coffee, his eyes bleary. Thankfully, the Twitter messages seemed to be depleting, and Louis was sure that if he kept his silence for a little while longer, then he’d go back to the dredges of the forgotten internet. Right where he wanted to be.

Louis downed the last of his coffee and grabbed his keys, heading out of his flat. The area Louis lived in was still mostly full of students, and he was itching to move on and away from it all. Maybe once his PhD was over he could start looking for more permanent places, perhaps a little further out.

The Doncaster streets were as busy as ever. Louis joined the crowd of walking commuters, slinging his bag over his shoulder and setting his face down towards the ground. An annoying light drizzle bled through the clouds, leaving a misty film dripping through his fringe, soaking into his jacket. He made it most of the way through the city without incident until he neared the street where the filming was happening.

As usual, there was a crowd of fans thronging the entrance to the closed road, their cameras out. Excited chatter filled the air. Louis kept his distance, his shoes squelching in the newly-formed puddles.

Only, something was different.

There were more people than usual, meaning that Louis had to battle his way through the crowds, much like on the very first day of the filming. The constant chatter fought its way into his ears, and there was the constant flash and snapping of several cameras going off.

Louis looked up, and cursed under his breath.

Harry Styles was standing at the front of the crowd, a smile on his face. He posed for photos with the fans, shook their hands, gave them hugs, even signed things they thrust in his face. And he wasn’t alone this time. A woman stood next to him, with blonde hair cut into a bob and a warm smile covering her features. Louis vaguely recognised her from somewhere.

The crowd was clamouring for attention, so Louis dropped back as far as he could, ducking his head. The last thing he needed was to get in more trouble. He directed his steps to give Harry Styles as wide a berth as he could, excusing himself as he pushed passed the people. If only he didn’t have to walk this _exact_ way to work…

“Oh, there you are!”

A collective gasp echoed through the crowd. Louis looked up to see that Harry was moving, the crowds parting to make way, and he was looking directly at Louis.

Directly at Louis, and _heading his way._

Louis cursed in his head, quickly glancing around for any kind of escape route. There _had_ to be a way out, didn’t there? But before he could dive out of the way, Harry was already closing in, that stupid smirk decorating his lips again. “I was waiting for you.”

A small _ooh_ sounded from the crowd.

Louis ignored it as best as he could, instead focusing on Harry. He shuffled his feet, trying to ignore the multitude of people staring up at him. “Um. Why?”

“Could do with your help.” Harry jerked his head, and Louis reluctantly followed him over towards the closed road. The crowd jostled around them, but the other woman with Harry distracted them easily enough, continuing to take pictures and sign things for them.

“One of the cameras is playing up,” Harry explained once they’d found their way to a quieter corner, “And I remembered your friend saying you were good with techy stuff, so–”

“Techy stuff?”

“– I thought I’d come find you,” Harry finished.

Louis just stared at him. “Did you just say _techy stuff_?”

“You know what I mean,” Harry waved a hand. “Anyway. Will you come take a look?”

Louis just stared at him.

Harry just invited him onto a film set.

_What?_

“Well?” Harry waved him on impatiently.

Louis shook his head. “First of all, you can’t just say _techy stuff_ and expect me to know what you mean –”

“I’ll explain on the way.”

“– And secondly, why on _earth_ are you asking _me_?”

Harry blinked. “Huh?”

Louis gave a short laugh. “Well, you must have technicians. People that can help. Why wait around for me?”

“Because the technician is an hour away,” Harry answered wryly, “And I remembered you usually come by around this time, so I thought I’d see if you’re free.”

Louis just stared at him.

“Are you?” Harry raised a brow. “Because if not, I’ll just head on back…”

“No, no,” Louis rushed. He pulled out his phone, checking the time. “I have a few minutes before I have to get to work.”

Harry smiled at him.

Actually _smiled._

“Come on, then.” He gestured for Louis to follow, leading him past the ROAD CLOSED sign and up into the smoky haze beyond.

Louis had to admit, he felt a spark of excitement flutter in his stomach. This was a proper, professional film set, for the film of a book that he absolutely loved, and he was actually getting to have a first look at it. Whatever crap he might have to put up with might actually be worth it. Harry strode along next to him, hands shoved deep in his black coat, his hair styled again. The road filled more and more with smoke the further on they walked.

Louis couldn’t resist staring around as they approached the set, feeling a little like a child in a sweet shop. Groups of people stood around the outskirts of the set, chattering quietly. The smoke machines provided a constant buzz in the background, blowing out gusts of the stuff to thickly coat the air, blurring the streets of Doncaster to look like another world. If we he was being honest, he was excited to see how the finished product would look with a bit of post-production magic.

“This way.” Harry caught Louis’s arm, steering him around the outskirts towards one of the cameras. A tall, lanky man was crouched over it, staring at the wires despairingly.

He looked up when Harry approached. “Is this the guy?”

“This is the guy,” Harry affirmed with a nod. “Louis, meet Nick Grimshaw.”

Nick got to his feet, holding out a hand, which Louis shook. Nick’s pale skin glistened with sweat, and his eyes were a little wild as he stared up at Louis. “ _Please_ tell me Harry wasn’t lying when he said you know about cameras.”

“Um.” Louis swallowed. “I mean, a bit?”

“A bit is better than nothing!” Nick gesticulated wildly at the camera. “The bloody thing hasn’t turned on _once,_ and Adam’s an hour away, and apparently no one else here has the first _clue_ how to fix it…”

“Hey, hey, don’t worry,” Harry soothed, his voice unusually calm. “Let Louis have a look.” He drew Nick away with a gentle hand on his arm, then shot Louis a meaningful stare over his shoulder.

Louis looked back a little helplessly. He didn’t actually know _much_ about hardware – Harry knew that, right? Louis was an editor, for goodness’ sake, he wasn’t much of a cameraman. All he’d done was film a bit for Zayn on occasion; not exactly the most experience in the world.

So he approached the camera with trepidation sitting in his gut.

He examined it for a while, pursing his lips and trying to figure out what was wrong. Nick hovered over his shoulder, his hands wringing together as he watched Louis’s every move. Harry watched them both with the ghost of a smile hovering over his lips.

After a few minutes, Louis had a _bit_ of an idea what might be wrong. Maybe. He fiddled with a few of the settings, his lips pursed. He could hear the sharp intake of breath from Nick every time his fingers so much as brushed the camera, and Louis was fairly sure that if he broke it, he’d be getting a _very_ expensive bill in the post.

Harry really should have run this by him before just walking Louis in here.

But, after a few more moments of playing with the settings, Louis stepped back. “Um. I think that might have helped?”

“Let me see,” Nick demanded, pushing passed Louis straight to the camera. Louis shot Harry a nervous look, his eyes wide, but Harry just sent him a reassuring smile. He reached out to grip Louis’s arm, and Louis almost jumped.

But no. Calm. He could exude professionalism if he really tried. Probably.

“Oh.” Nick had a hand pressed to his mouth. “My God.”

“What?” Louis’s stomach dropped.

Nick was silent for another moment, playing with the camera, and then his face brightened up into a giant grin. “You’re a genius! It worked!”

Louis released a long sigh of relief.

“Harry,” Nick demanded, “Bring your friend whenever something goes wrong. He’ll be more reliable than Adam.”

“I will, at that,” Harry responded quietly, his brown eyes glittering at Louis.

Louis looked back uncertainly. Surely Harry couldn’t be serious. A professional film set like this _had_ to be able to afford proper technicians.

Also, had he just been called Harry’s _friend?_

Nick span back around and grabbed Louis’s hand, giving it an enthusiastic shake. Louis was showered in thank-yous, and promises to come and see the set properly sometime if he wanted to. Louis leaped on that opportunity, his eyes brightening. The actual set of ‘ _Don’t Worry Darling’_? There was nothing Louis wanted more.

Zayn would be jealous, though. Maybe Louis could try and find a way to sneak him in somehow.

After a while, Nick explained about having to get back to work, so Harry led Louis back towards the ROAD CLOSED sign. The crowd was still there, so Harry drew them to a stop a little ways away, where they were still mostly covered by the smoke machine. He eyed Louis closely. “Thanks for that.”

“It’s no problem,” Louis shrugged his shoulders lightly.

“It was to Nick,” Harry answered wryly, “And he’s lead cameraman, so if he had a problem, we all would. I owe you.”

Louis’s brows shot up. “That was the _lead_ cameraman?!”

Harry arched a brow. “Yeah?”

“Oh. My God.” Louis dug his fingers into his palms, drawing in a breath. “I just helped the _lead cameraman._ On ‘ _Don’t Worry Darling’._ I – um. Wow.”

Harry chuckled at him. “So you _are_ a fan? I thought you hated this ‘crappy adaption’.”

“Hey.” Louis winced. “I apologised about that.”

“You still said it.”

“I was in a bad mood,” Louis protested, “And the book is great, I mean, it _is_ gonna be tough for a film to do it justice.”

“See, there, I actually agree with you,” Harry mused, pursing his lips. “Thing is, I’ve read the script, and seen the other people in it, and they’re good. Plus, you know, they have me.” He winked at Louis.

Louis rolled his eyes. “You’re still absolutely insufferable.”

“You love it really.”

“Oh, do I?” Louis raised his eyebrows.

Harry just smirked at him. “I think you do, more than you’d admit.”

Louis stared at him.

“You seemed to enjoy my film last night, anyway,” Harry added breezily, just as a distant shout of his name sounded from somewhere in the midst. Harry turned, peering through the smoke, and then gave a low sigh. “That was the director. Break time is over.”

Louis stumbled back a step.

_The director._ Louis didn’t even know who that was, but if they were directing ‘ _Don’t Worry Darling_ _’,_ they must be pretty well known.

Harry caught his look and grinned. “Don’t have another fangirl moment. I’ll introduce you some other time.”

“Excuse you,” Louis huffed, folding his arms. He watched as Harry laughed at him, his face lighting up, and it made something funny shift in Louis’s chest.

“Whatever you say,” Harry shook his head, a smile still playing about his lips. He shrugged off his black coat, revealing tight black jeans, a floral blowse and black boots to match.

Oh. He must be in costume.

Louis was getting a sneak peek at one of ‘ _Don’t Worry Darling’s_ main characters.

“Um,” Louis blurted, “Who’re you playing again?”

Harry looked mildly amused. “Do you not even know _that_?”

“I read it somewhere,” Louis answered defensively, “I just forgot.”

Harry shook his head at him. “I’ll just leave you to look it up again, then.” He backed away from Louis with a final cheery wave, a smirk at his lips as he disappeared back into the smoke.

Louis watched him go, and for some reason, he couldn’t quite bring himself to feel annoyed.

…

Louis was out for rather a long time. He had a long shift at the bookstore, after arriving a little late for only the second time in his career (and once again thanks to Harry Styles). Liam was a bit disappointed, the look he sent Louis lingering, and Louis knew he’d have to grovel for a while to make it up to him. He spent extra time sorting through the books on the top shelves that day.

It wasn’t until much later, towards the end of his shift, that Louis got a bit of a surprise. He was languishing in one of the armchairs in a corner of the bookshop, by his favourite window, with a new horror book open in front of him. His legs were up over the arm, when, three chapters in, his phone buzzed in his pocket.

Louis tugged it out, fully expecting a text from Zayn or his mum or someone, and raised a brow when it was Twitter with a notification that Harry Styles had mentioned him.

_@harry-styles:_ _So turns out Incredibly Rude Man is actually pretty good at techy stuff @lwt91_

Accompanying the tweet was a photo of Louis leaning over the camera from that morning, his hair falling into somewhat of a fringe and his brows furrowed in concentration. Louis’s eyes widened. He hadn’t even seen Harry with his phone out earlier, but apparently, he’d snuck a photo and now decided to broadcast it to the whole internet.

Sure enough, retweets and replies were already starting to flood in, mentioning the both of them. Harry’s thousands of followers hadn’t calmed down any since Louis last checked Twitter, then. And he’d been trying to _avoid_ internet drama.

_@KIWIXX:_ _@harry_styles @lwt91 OMG NO WAY LOOK AT HIM_

_@harryislife:_ _@harry_styles @lwt91 ooh visiting you on set? Is he secretly a fangirl?_

Even as Louis was reading through the messages, Harry replied to that last one.

_@harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 @harryislife good point maybe he is, would explain his blush ;)_

Louis nearly dropped his phone.

_What the hell was Harry doing?_ Why did he reply to that? It was clear from Harry’s Twitter page that he liked to interact closely with his fanbase, making a point to reply to as many of them as he could. But why would he draw attention _that?_ Was he trying to get Louis’s attention?

Well, if he was, it was working.

Louis typed out a tweet, pursing his lips. He really wasn’t sure if he should reply, based on the last time he got embroiled in a Twitter fight with _Harry Styles,_ of all people.

But he couldn’t just let this lie.

_@lwt91:_ _@harry_styles @harryislife Harry wishes. I was just impressed by the camera (didn’t see your sneaky photo skills Styles)_

_@harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 are you sure sounds suspicious to me ;)_

The reply was instantaneous, and Louis got a bit of a kick out of the thought that maybe Harry had been sitting on Twitter waiting for him to respond.

_@lwt91:_ _@harry_styles Think you have wishful thinking_

_@harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 if I wish it will it come true ;)_

Louis couldn’t hold back a surprised laugh at that. He was grinning at his phone without even realising it, and all because of Harry. His Twitter was still being flooded with reply after reply, and his follower count was increasing, and Louis allowed himself a moment to process. Maybe Harry wasn’t such a bad person. He _did_ get Louis onto the film set earlier, and he was getting Louis noticed on Twitter. He certainly wasn’t _harming_ Louis’s career.

Louis clicked on the replies to Harry’s latest tweet, scrolling through them with a slight smile. Most were the usual fangirlish squeals, and a few comments wondering just who exactly Louis was. A couple even called him hot, which both flattered and confused Louis more than anything.

Then, Louis got a series of texts through that just made him laugh harder.

**_Z:_ ** _YOU GOT ONTO THE SET?!?!_

**_Z:_ ** _AND HARRY STYLES IS TWEETING YOU_

**_Z:_ ** _WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH LOUIS TOMLINSON_

Louis snickered, leaning his head back against the armchair and staring at the ceiling. He felt warm, excited, his veins tingling with something new. His life finally, _finally,_ felt like it might be going somewhere.

And then Liam reappeared from upstairs and called him over to help, and so he was up on his feet stacking shelves again, sorting through piles and piles of old books that felt more like home than his actual flat. Then a flow of customers appeared, and Louis spent his time helping elderly men fetch books from the top shelves, or teaching children the best way to choose the next book to read, or making Liam a cup of tea when he was buried in the middle of his finance sheets. As such, he didn’t have time to check his phone again until after his shift.

On his way home, Louis typed out a response to Zayn, calming him down and assuring him he’d explain everything later. Then he opened up Twitter again, giving a surprised laugh at the _thousands_ of replies now flooding his notifications.

_@Stylesislife:_ _@harry_styles @lwt91 is this incredibly rude man back again?!?!_

_@followthetheatre:_ _ok but @Harry_styles taking random surprise pics of @lwt91 is suddenly all I live for_

And then came the reply that shocked Louis into stillness.

_@harrylovebot:_ @Harry_styles @lwt91 is it bad that I kinda ship them???

He had been on the internet for long enough to know what ‘ship’ meant. He’d seen the crazy edits, the endless blogging, the constant theories about celebrities or fictional characters that fans seemed to have an incessant need to throw together.

But never, not ever in a million _years_ , did Louis expect to see the word about him.

Him and _Harry Styles,_ of all people.

_Harry Styles._

What?

Had _Harry_ seen this tweet?

Hurriedly, Louis clicked onto Harry’s profile, letting out a slightly relieved breath when he realised that Harry hadn’t tweeted since he’d answered Louis’s last comment. So even if he _had_ seen it, he hadn’t responded. Did he not want to draw attention to it, then? The idea of any kind of _ship_ was utterly ridiculous. Harry was straight after all. Or maybe Harry didn’t want to make Louis uncomfortable.

Not that he’d thought twice about that before posting a photo of Louis without permission.

But Louis couldn’t even bring himself to be mad about that. After all, it would be doing his career wonders to have actual physical evidence that he’d been on the film set of _‘Don’t Worry Darling’._ No, the only thing Louis regretted was not snapping a photo of Harry in return.

Well, maybe it wasn’t too late?

Louis continued his walk home, pursing his lips, and then he approached the ROAD CLOSED sign that contained the film set behind it. The cameras were still going, and he could hear voices faintly through the crisp night air. A touch of drizzle was falling from the sky – not enough to be uncomfortable, but just enough to add a chill to the air. Louis hesitated by the sign.

Nick _had_ said he was welcome back any time.

Nibbling on his lip, Louis slid out his phone again and sent a quick text to Zayn.

**_Louis:_ ** _I’m by the film set again. Kind of want to sneak on. Advice?_

He shifted his weight in the cold, wrapping his arms around his torso, his phone clutched in his hand. Zayn always managed to keep more of a level head than Louis. When Louis was tearing his hair out over an essay deadline, or panicking about missing too many lectures, Zayn was the one he would turn to. In fact, Zayn was a large reason why Louis even survived his undergrad in the first place.

It didn’t take long for his phone to buzz with a reply.

**Z:** NO ADVICE JUST GO!!

**Z:** and if you tell them my name as well I won’t exactly be unhappy :P

Louis’s lips twitched up, despite the nerves still jangling around in his stomach. He swallowed, taking a careful deep breath.

He counted to ten before taking his first step passed the ROAD CLOSED sign.

He could hear the faint sounds of the director yelling instructions, so Louis tried to remain as quiet as possible. If they were mid-filming, the _last_ thing he wanted was to make background noise and get kicked off the set for good. Instead, he stepped carefully forward, avoiding the trails of wires and trying to stay out of the lighting.

As he got closer, Louis began to make out the shapes of the cameramen standing around the edge of the set. There were several other people leaning against the walls, wrapped up in thick coats – Louis guessed they were assistant directors, or producers, or costume and make-up to make sure everything ran smoothly. Louis dodged to the side, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible.

His inkling was right – filming was currently going on. The woman with blonde hair that he’d vaguely recognised this morning was standing in the centre of the street, wearing a long blue dress, reciting lines that he vaguely recognised from the book. Beside her were two other people – one, a man Louis didn’t recognise.

The other was Harry.

He was standing tall and proud, staring at the actress as if she was his entire world. His face was the epitome of rapture. He was wearing outfit as this morning, but there was an unknown parcel in his hand this time. His hair was curlier than usual in the damp drizzle.

Louis swung his gaze away, trying not to stare. His eyes landed on Nick, who gave him a thumbs-up and a grin from behind his camera. Louis managed a shaky smile in return. At least he wasn’t going to get kicked off.

The scene lasted for another couple of minutes, with all three of the actors saying a few lines. They were a bit distant for Louis to make out the words, but he thought he recognized this scene came from somewhere in the middle of the book.

After half a second of silence, a voice called out, “ _Cut!”._ The actors immediately relaxed, and the blonde actress was quickly swamped by costume people, touching up her dress and her hair. Harry stayed in conversation with the other male actor, occasionally smiling.

Louis stayed back, biting his lip. Well, Harry hadn’t given _him_ any notice when he took his photograph, had he? Louis decided he could return the courtesy. So, he lifted his phone and zoomed in on Harry’s face, deciding he probably shouldn’t spoil the costume design on one of the biggest films of the year. Instead, he snapped a quick photo of Harry’s face. He had tried to catch Harry in the most unattractive angle possible: his hair was a mess of curls from the rain, his eyes half-closed, his mouth open as he was mid-speaking. But after taking the sneaky snap, even Louis could admit that he still looked gorgeous.

Louis decided to wait until he was safely back home before he tweeted it.

As he looked up, he caught Nick’s eye again. The tall man waved him over with a white-toothed grin. “Glad you came back! Louis, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah?” Louis smiled, pleased that the _lead cameraman_ had actually remembered his name.

“Well, it’s good to see you again,” Nick smiled warmly. “You saved my life earlier, we’re already behind on filming.”

“I’m just glad I could help,” Louis replied honestly. “I can do it again anytime, honestly.”

“I’m going to hold you to that. Harry said you’d be good, I should have trusted him.”

Louis blinked. “He did?”

“Yep.” Nick ducked behind his camera again, fiddling with a few of the settings. “Said you were reliable and steady-handed, which is the only reason I let you touch my baby at _all._ Harry’s got good taste.”

Louis just stared, struggling to digest the information that _Harry Styles_ apparently thought he was _reliable and steady-handed._

Just then, the director called the set to quiet again, so Nick waved him away with a smile and a promise that he was welcome to return at any time. Louis nodded, making up his mind to return as soon as he could. He still owed Zayn a mention, after all.

Louis headed back home with a spring to his step.

When he got back to his flat, he wasted no time at all in tweeting the picture of Harry, accompanying it with a suitably snarky comment.

_@lwt91:_ _so @Harry_styles isn’t the only one who can take sneaky shots_

The photo was posted underneath, and Louis placed his phone on his kitchen counter as he set about making himself some dinner. It buzzed repeatedly with notifications as he cooked, but Louis resisted the urge to look until he was seated with his plate of spaghetti and could browse at his leisure.

_@DWDSTYLES:_ _LOOK THERE’S ANOTHER ONE GUYS I CAN’T @Harry_styles @lwt91_

_@lilyStyles:_ _ok why is he so obsessed with harry tho? @Harry_styles @lwt91_

_@fresStyles:_ _are we sure they aren’t already dating? #ishipit @Harry_styles @lwt91_

Louis choked on his food a little at the last one. He tried not to think too much about it, but his face slowly started to heat up. How was he supposed to know if he and Harry were flirting? Did a few snarky tweets and a couple of emojis equal flirting? Clearly that was enough for the fans.

Louis shut off his Twitter notifications again, resolving to lose himself in a football match for the night and forget about any stupid famous actors and their stupidly large fanbases. He couldn’t quite forget that Harry did actually snap a photo of him, though. Honestly, Louis had no idea Harry was even paying that much attention to him, but apparently he deemed him good enough to invite him onto the actual film set. And now that Nick had invited him back, Louis had an incredible opportunity for his career.

Louis could _almost_ forgive Harry for his attitude, if he managed to give Louis a step up in his career. No matter how much his stomach still soured a little.

But it was networking, it was allowed. Wasn’t it?

Louis shook his head, burying himself in his favourite distraction. A good match of footy felt much better than his own circling, churning thoughts.

It wasn’t until much later that night that he dared to check Twitter again, and unsurprisingly there was a response from Harry to his photo, as a well as a new DM sitting in Louis’s inbox.

_@Harry_styles: @lwt91 you cheeky little shit. It. Is. ON._

Louis could feel the smile curling at the corners of his mouth before he even realised. He chuckled softly, then tapped on his DM inbox. His eyes widened when he saw a private message from actual Harry Styles.

**_Harry Styles:_ ** _Careful, Lou. You don’t start a photo war with me._

Louis stared at his phone with a silly grin on his face for far longer than was probably acceptable. He never, ever, in a million years, would have believed that _Harry Styles_ of all people would be messaging him with this much familiarity. Or call him _Lou._

But there the messages sat, plain as day.

Louis decided to leave the public messages for now, not wanting to encourage any of Harry’s fanbase. He was reluctant to admit it, but the overwhelming response to his every tweet scared Louis a little. They seemed the type of people to pick over his every word, never mind the fact they seemed to actually _ship_ him and Harry.

And that was just ridiculous, wasn’t it? After all, Harry had only marked Louis an 8 when someone asked him if Louis was hot.

Not that Louis was bitter about that at all.

And Louis, well, he had no real interest in relationships. And he was positive that Harry wouldn’t want a relationship with him – he was straight after all, right?

So instead, Louis settled on replying to Harry’s DM, still marvelling at the fact he had a private conversation with _Harry Styles,_ of all people.

**_Louis Tomlinson:_ ** _I think I can handle you, Harry. Besides, you started it_

Louis settled back in his sofa, sliding his phone back into his pocket, but it buzzed before it was even half-way there. Louis jerked. Harry couldn’t have replied already, could he? Surely he had better things to be doing on a Friday night?

**_Harry Styles:_ ** _Just be warned, Tomlinson. I will DESTROY you_

Louis couldn’t help but grin at that.

**_Louis Tomlinson:_ ** _You can try_


	5. V

The next Monday morning, Louis couldn’t resist heading back to the film set.

Part of the reason was that he’d woken to several mildly angry texts from Zayn demanding a chance to get on the set, and how unfair it was that Louis had been there _twice_ without inviting him along, and how this was really a betrayal of their friendship because hello they’d been friends for years and did everything together and how dare Louis be moving on without him???

Louis had chuckled and replied, promising he would get Zayn there somehow.

Of course, his decision to go back to the film set had absolutely nothing to do with seeing Harry again.

Twitter had still been explosive that morning, and Louis only managed a few minutes on there before he had to turn it off again. The constant flood of notifications was totally overwhelming after a while. He paused for long enough to see that the comments shipping him and Harry seemed to be getting more and more prominent, and he clicked off Twitter with a bit more warmth to his cheeks than usual.

The issue was, Louis had absolutely no idea if he and Harry were ‘flirting’, as the fans put it. How was he supposed to know? Sure, they wound each other up, even Zayn had picked up on that. But that didn’t mean it ran any deeper, did it? Harry couldn’t _possibly_ feel anything remotely close to that for Louis. There was no point even entertaining the thought.

Even if Louis begrudgingly admitted that Harry was pretty funny, and he enjoyed talking to him, there was no need for it to go beyond maybe a cautious friendship. A friendship that involved a lot of teasing and poking fun, sure, but that was allowed, wasn’t it? This was all just fangirl nonsense, and Louis was wasting his time by paying any mind to it at all.

But … what if they were right?

Louis shook his head. No. Harry was straight, wasn’t he? Louis was sure he’d seen articles about him going out with actresses and Victoria’s Secret models before. Not that he’d ever paid that much attention, celebrity culture had never done much to pique his interest.

Maybe it wouldn’t hurt if Louis had a quick check.

Pulling his laptop towards him, Louis decidedly pushed away any morals that might have told him this was a questionable thing to do. Googling people you actually knew in real life didn’t really count as stalking, did it? Louis gnawed on his lip, hovering over google, but then he punched in the same search as he had before – _‘Harry Styles’._

The usual set of results came up. Articles about his latest films, various interviews he’d given in the past, endless photos of him out and about in London – Louis paused for a moment, wondering what it was like to live under that kind of constant scrutiny. Harry, to him, had seemed warm and witty. A little distant, yes, a little guarded, maybe, but underneath that he had a nice smile and a steady gaze. For someone as young as he was, Louis thought he was handling the stress of fame very well.

Or maybe Louis just hadn’t dug deep enough.

He bit at his lip again, debating whether or not he should take this next step, before he amended his search, typing in, ‘ _Harry Styles girlfriend’._

Again, a flood of results came through instantly. They shifted towards more tabloid type articles, and Louis felt a little dirty as he clicked on the first one. Immediately, a photo of Harry popped up, with a small smirk on his lips and his arm wound around the waist of a petite woman.

Louis recognised her instantly – she’d played his love interest in _‘Kiwi_ , they had great chemistry on screen. Louis pursed his lips as he read through the beginning of the article.

_**LOVE IN THE AIR? STYLES AND WILDE SEEN OUT AGAIN** _

_It’s been no secret that these two lovebirds have been closeted up together, but new pictures today highlight how the pair remain inseparable in the run-up to their new film release. ‘Kiwi is tipped to be a favourite, but will this love affair last once the on-screen magic subsides?_

Louis checked the date of the article – over a year ago, when _‘Kiwi_ was first released. A strange feeling of relief washed over Louis then. Surely he’d know if something between Harry and his co-star had lasted? He clicked back onto the home page, scrolling through the articles until he found a more recent one. In fact, it was dated just last month.

_**Goodbye or Fresh Start for Love’s Young Dream?** _

_This month might signal the end of one of the nation’s favourite celeb couples, much to our chagrin. Harry Styles and Olivia Wilde have been popular amongst fans since they were first seen together in ‘Kiwi, and over the past year they’ve been out and about together frequently, to much of our audiences’ pleasure._

_But could this be the end for the perfect young couple?_

_Styles is rumoured to have landed a huge casting role – one that will take him away from London for months. Wilde, however, looks to be remaining in the city. Will this couple survive the distance? Our money’s on no, if these goodbye pictures are anything to go by._

Beneath the text was another photo of Harry and the woman, this time caught in a hug. The texture was grainy, clearly taken on a phone, and it looked like they were standing outside some kind of swanky apartment building. The next pictures caused something inside Louis to swirl. There, clear as day were Harry and the woman, _Olivia,_ locked in what looked to be a heated snogging session. The Houses of Parliament were vaguely visible in the background.

Louis took in a breath, suddenly hit with the realisation of just how different Harry’s life was to his own. Harry was the kind of person who had reporters following his every movement, who couldn’t do anything without having endless reams of articles speculating about the reasoning behind his actions. He must be used to attention. He must bathe in it. No wonder he was always hanging out with his fans and at replying them on Twitter as soon as they responded to anything he said.

But Louis? Louis was a nobody. He was 26 with very little to show for it, aside from his two (soon to be three, if he ever started that thesis) degrees. He was struggling to get into an industry that would probably never accept him, still stuck in a tiny student flat, with barely one friend to his name.

He had no business poking his head into Harry’s world.

Feeling a little sick, Louis closed all the tabs on his internet browser in one sweeping motion. He should stop harbouring any sort of fantasies that Harry might be interested in him. In any capacity. In fact, Louis should feel _relieved._ He hated being the centre of attention. He had no interest in Harry’s world.

And he had no interest in Harry himself, either. Louis didn’t want that kind of relationship.

_Did he?_

Louis groaned, scrubbing a hand over his face. He should put these silly thoughts to bed. A few comments on the internet were just that – comments. He didn’t need to read anything into Harry’s behaviour, not at all. And honestly, Louis shouldn’t even _like_ Harry Styles. He stood for everything Louis disliked about the industry he was trying to get into.

But Louis couldn’t help it if Harry made him smile.

Louis groaned, rubbing a hand over his face again. Everything was far too complicated for him. Better he just stopped thinking too much, didn’t look any more into Harry Styles’s life, and just carried on as he had been. After all, Harry and he had managed a vaguely normal conversation last time they spoke. Maybe that was something Louis would be able to capitalise on, internet be damned.

Louis made sure to leave early for his shift, so he would have enough time to drop by the film set without being late again. Liam was forgiving, if stern, but Louis didn’t particularly want to miss the start of his shift for the third time this month.

He walked the streets of Doncaster with his hands shoved deep into his coat pockets, his hair flopping messily over his forehead. The streets were quite busy that morning, with the usual flow of commuters keeping up their clamouring footsteps. The disruption to the city wasn’t just affecting Louis – all the road closures left far too many people with no other option than to walk or cycle through the city.

Louis walked rapidly, pleased for his long stride. He was itching to get back on the film set. If he asked nicely, would Nick let him have a look at their editing process? He doubted he’d be able to man one of the cameras, but he would absolutely _love_ to see some of their special effects, if he was allowed to stick around for that long. Plus, he’d promised to ask if Zayn could come on set sometime.

And maybe if Louis happened to see Harry again, that wouldn’t be such a terrible thing either.

The usual crowd of people stood scattered by the ROAD CLOSED sign, although there were fewer people than the day before. None of the actors were waiting by the side, either.

Louis tried to ignore the tiniest, most minute slither of disappointment he might feel at not seeing Harry there again.

But if none of the actors were here, that must mean filming was in process. Which would make it a prime time for Louis to get onto the set and see if he could have a play with some of their technology.

He shuffled quickly through the crowd, doing his best to ignore the stares when he walked right passed the ROAD CLOSED sign. Without anyone else to lead him, Louis really wasn’t sure if he should just walk straight up to the set, but well, Nick _had_ explicitly invited him back. And he was fairly sure Harry wouldn’t send him off, either. Still, Louis tossed a slightly apologetic smile over his shoulder as he walked up the road towards the set, pushing his hands into the pockets of his space coat.

Artificial smoke whirled around him as he moved up the street, so thick that he couldn’t see his shoes a few steps in. The buildings either side of the road were muted in the grey-black of the cloudy morning. Only a few fuzzy spots of light showed from somewhere up ahead.

He approached as silently as he could, his ears perked, and he was relieved he did when he realised that filming was indeed going on. The cameras were set up the same way they were last time he’d visited last night, but the scene was different. This time, the blonde actress (Louis still couldn’t remember her name) was sitting in a luxury car, getting in and out repeatedly as the cameras captured the movement. By her side was the actor Louis hadn’t recognised, but there was no sign of Harry.

They were mid-filming, so Louis kept his distance, hanging back in the smoke. He spotted Nick, but he was crouched behind his camera with a rather intent stare, so Louis decided not to risk going over to see him just yet. Instead, he hovered in the background, surveying the set with interested eyes.

And then he spotted Harry Styles staring straight at him.

Louis jumped. He clapped a hand over his mouth to stop a startled yelp from escaping him, not wanting to disrupt the filming, and saw Harry roll his eyes fondly in response. Harry was leaning against a wall on the side of the street, far away from the filming. He was in a giant coat covering up his costume, but his hair was still done in that odd upwards style they clearly had for the character he was playing. His usual floppy curls were swept back, revealing his forehead and giving him a slightly older look. He still had a serious case of babyface, though.

And he was only 21. Louis should probably remember that.

Harry smirked under his gaze, and he lifted a hand, crooking two fingers to beckon Louis over. Louis cast a quick look back at the set before creeping his way over towards Harry, moving as silently as he could. His footsteps still echoed a little too loudly for his liking, but he figured he was far enough away from the cameras for it not to matter.

“Back again, I see,” Harry murmured as soon as Louis was within earshot, shifting a little to make room beside him against the wall.

Louis took the offered space, not close enough to touch, but enough that he could sense the warmth emanating from Harry at his side. “Thought I should,” he answered quietly. “Someone kept bothering me on Twitter.”

Harry snorted softly. He turned just enough to send Louis an inquisitive look, and Louis shifted a little, adjusting to having to look _up_ at someone.

“Yeah. Well, you give as good as you get, Tomlinson.”

Louis quirked a bow.

Harry shook his head. “I didn’t even _see_ you take that picture of me.”

“Came back last night,” Louis explained nonchalantly, “And I didn’t see you snap one of me either, Styles.”

“You were a bit busy with the camera.”

“ _You_ were a bit busy with the acting.”

Harry allowed himself another smile at that. Louis was quickly deciding he liked the way Harry’s entire face warmed with just the slightest shift of his lips, and he was glad when the expression remained as Harry turned back towards Louis, murmuring, “Well, it is my job.”

“Really?” Louis pressed a hand to his chest. “Damn I never would have guessed.”

Harry glared at him.

“I mean,” Louis continued with a smirk, “It isn’t like you spend _literally all your time_ talking about it…”

“Hey.”

“…Telling everyone how famous you are, doing stupid stuff like starting Twitter fights…”

“That was mostly you,” Harry interrupted indignantly.

Louis frowned at him. “Excuse me?”

“You were the one that responded.”

“Because you lied about me,” Louis pointed out casually.

“How did I lie?!”

“You know as well as I do that I wasn’t that rude deliberately,” Louis folded his arms with a nod. “Besides, I wasn’t saying anything that wasn’t true.”

Harry let out another disbelieving laugh. “So you’re still saying I can’t act, and I was just picked for my pretty face?”

“I never said you couldn’t act,” Louis countered. “In fact, you’re pretty fantastic, _‘Kiwi_ is my all-time fav, but that doesn’t mean you can do _‘Don’t Worry Darling’_ justice.”

Harry was smirking again as he surveyed Louis closely. “Your all-time fav, huh?”

Louis bit down hard on his inner cheek. Shit. He was pretty sure he’d vowed never to admit that out loud in front of Harry Styles himself.

“I bet I was your favourite character and everything,” Harry added confidently, “You have the air of a Alex fan.”

Louis spluttered. “I wasn’t – I didn’t – I’ll have you know I like loads of characters.”

“Sure.” Harry chuckled again, sending Louis an appreciative smirk. “You know, you don’t have to put on a front all the time. It _is_ ok to admit to me that you like me.”

Louis let out a long breath. “You’re insufferable.”

“So I am,” Harry acknowledged, “But so are you, so I’d say we call it even.”

Louis gritted his teeth, rolling his eyes. He turned to face Harry and stuck out his hand, expression set. “Fine. We’ll call it even.”

Harry’s deep green eyes flicked down to Louis’s hand, one of his perfect eyebrows lifting just enough. He glanced back up at Louis, then down at his hand again, and Louis shifted, beginning to wonder if Harry was just going to leave him hanging here forever.

But then Harry removed his own hand from his pocket and took Louis’s hand in his own. His grip was firm, and warm, and nothing at all like Louis would have expected from him. “Alright. Even.”

Louis looked back up at him, and this time, he smiled.

Harry smiled right back.

The moment held, in which they gripped each other’s fingers and looked each other in the eyes, and neither of them particularly felt like breaking away. Louis studied Harry’s face – the same face he’d seen so many times on screen, but never in this sort of clarity. Harry’s skin was smooth, his expression unreadable. He had a lovely, open face, but he was annoyingly good at hiding his emotions.

_Of course he is,_ Louis thought grumpily. _He’s a trained actor._

Eventually, Louis pulled away from his grip and leaned against the wall beside Harry again. “Anyway. So. You remember Zayn?”

“Yeah, your mate yeah?”

“Yeah, him.” Louis replied lightly, nothing how Harry’s expression seemed suddenly guarded. “He wants to come on set sometime.” Louis jammed his thumbs into his jeans pocket, firmly studying the pavement by his feet. “Saw the photos on Twitter, of – um – you know, the ones you and me posted.”

“I see.” Harry’s tone was warm with amusement, yet his tone was more cautious than before. “Is he jealous you keep coming here?”

“Maybe a little,” Louis admitted. “And I maybe sort of promised to get him on, to pacify him. So. Um. Could you pull some strings?”

Harry raised both brows at Louis, a smirk still tugging at the corner of his mouth. “The man who hates blockbuster films, using contacts to ahead? Your morals are all a lie, Louis.”

Louis screwed his face up. He tried to ignore the small shiver elicited by the natural way his name rolled off Harry’s tongue. Trust Harry to use the tiniest thing against him. “Whatever. So can you?”

“I suppose I could have a word with the director,” Harry agreed with a small smirk.

Louis let out a breath.

Harry held out a hand, gesturing as he spoke again. “Gimme your phone.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m gonna put in my number so you can text me, and then I’ll tell you when your friend can come on.” Harry was smirking again, damn him. “Unless you want me to just publicly announce it on Twitter?”

“You didn’t seem to have a problem with posting my face without asking,” Louis muttered.

Harry gave a light shrug. “Thought you deserved it. Did you mind? I can take it down…”

“It’s fine,” Louis answered honestly. He paused for just a second before digging out his phone and handing it over to Harry, figuring he might as well.

After all, _actual Harry Styles_ had just asked for his number. For all Louis’s deep, idealistic sentiments, he couldn’t deny that was kind of exciting. He’d be an idiot to turn an opportunity like this down.

For career purposes only, of course. He absolutely wasn’t thinking about anything else.

Besides, Harry had only been seen with a girl before. Louis had no idea if he was even interested in boys. And he didn’t care about finding out, either.

Harry took the phone from Louis with a slight frown, holding it at arm’s length. “What the hell is that?”

“A phone,” Louis deadpanned.

Harry rolled his eyes at him. “Looks more like a relic from the dinosaurs to me.”

“Hey,” Louis rushed quickly to his phone’s defence – yes, he was still sporting a pretty ancient version of the iPhone, but it worked pretty well anyway. “It’s probably more reliable than any of your modern, million-pound ones.”

“You sound like my grandma.” Harry was smirking again as he put his number into Louis’s phone, handing it back to Louis with a lingering look. “I bet you’re ancient.”

“Just because we’re not all young prodigies like you,” Louis huffed, eliciting another snort of laughter from Harry. Louis surveyed the number before moving to slide his phone back into his pocket.

“Hey, don’t put your phone away yet. You need to text me your number.”

“Oh yeah,” Louis answered lamely, clicking on Harry’s – _Harry Styles’s_ – number, firing off a short text.

Something in Harry’s pocket vibrated, and he reached into his giant coat, extracting the most modern form of the latest giant touch-screen monstrosity. Louis wrinkled his nose at the sight of it.

Harry caught his expression and smirked. “Is this modern technology a bit too advanced for you?”

“You are the worst kind of person,” Louis grumbled.

“So you keep saying,” Harry answered breezily, “But you keep reappearing.”

“Mostly because you won’t leave me alone.”

“Well, yes, that may be a problem.” Harry was moving before Louis could fully comprehend that sentiment. He lifted his stupidly large phone in front of his face, turning to face Louis. He held that position for a suspiciously long amount of time.

Louis’s eyes narrowed. It took him a long moment to figure out what Harry was probably doing.

Louis shoved a hand up in front of Harry’s phone, letting out a huff. “Hey! Are you sneaking more photos of me?”

“Maybe.” Harry shot him an impish grin, and the expression looked out-of-place and adorable on his usually sardonic face.

Louis paused for a moment, processing, until he leaned back against the wall and grumbled, “You’re getting suspiciously good at stalking me.”

Harry choked. “Excuse me?”

“Well, you know,” Louis waved a hand, keeping his voice low and one eye on the film set, “Memorising my work schedule so you could intercept me, getting my attention on Twitter…”

“You,” Harry growled, “Are impossible.”

“And now you just keep taking photos of me,” Louis shoved his hands in his pockets and grinned sidelong at Harry. “I’m flattered, honestly.”

“Oh my God, shut up.” Harry lifted his eyes heavenwards, but a small smile was lifting his lips.

Louis’s grin only widened. He settled into place next to Harry, a comfortable silence enveloping them just like the tendrils of smoke curling around their ankles. They both watched the film set for a while, too far to hear the words spoken, but the silence was oddly comforting. If Louis half-closed his eyes, he could fancy that he and Harry were wandering alone in their own world.

But then his phone buzzed, and he glanced down to see an alarm set for his work. Louis grimaced. “Ah, fuck, I’m late. Again. You keep doing that, Harry Styles.”

Harry sent Louis a sharp smirk. “Not my fault you can’t keep away.”

Louis placed his hand on Harry’s shoulder and gave a light push, just enough to dislodge Harry a little. Harry brushed off his shoulder with an indignant snort. Louis rolled his eyes – honestly, this complete baby of a grown man – and stepped away from the wall, starting back towards the main road.

“Tomlinson,” Harry called, making Louis pause again. “Don’t be too surprised if you’re on Twitter again later. You _did_ start a war with me.”

Louis shook his head, answering over his shoulder, “I think you’ll find you started everything.”

Harry Styles’s quiet chuckle followed him back to the street, and Louis was finding it impossible to be irritated at him any longer.


	6. VI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bit of a longer chapter for you guys!   
> Some flirty banter? A bit of angst? Who knows?   
> Read on :D

It was almost natural after that – the way Harry just fell into place in Louis’s life.

It turned out that Harry wasn’t lying about the photo war, because once Louis finally arrived into work that morning and got a chance to check his phone again, there was another tweet with a photo from earlier.

_@Harry_styles:_ _Incredibly Rude Man stopped by again. He nearly caught me taking this one_

And underneath was a photo from that morning – an unnecessarily zoomed-in close up of Louis’s face.

Louis rolled his eyes at the number of replies already flooding Harry’s Twitter, but Harry hadn’t directly responded to any of them, so Louis left it alone for now as well. He went back to loitering behind the counter, watching the ground floor while Liam refreshed some of the stock in the three upper floors. In fact, he didn’t respond until after he’d got off work for the day and sneaked back onto the set on his way home, only just for long enough to snap a quick photo of Harry mid-snack, his mouth open, a sandwich held tight in his hand.

Louis quite enjoyed crafting his tweet to accompany that one.

_@lwt91:_ _@Harry_styles posing with his lunch. He DIDN’T catch me taking this one._

And when Louis awoke the next morning, his Twitter following had increased by the thousands. The floods of replies were the same as ever, and he shut off his notifications before heading out to the library to pick up some books for his PhD research (yes, he was still working on his thesis, his life hadn’t just become about sneaking photos of some arrogant celebrity).

And, well, from there things just sort of … escalated.

Naturally, Louis slipped onto the film set every day on his walk to work to check if Harry was there or not. Usually, Harry was filming, so Louis loitered in the chaos and snapped several prime photos of him mid-line, theatrical, or just wandering around the set on his break with a half-eaten sandwich hanging from his grip.

And Harry, well – Harry would lie in wait for Louis, and he was getting increasingly sneaky about it. On the days when Louis went onto the set and couldn’t find Harry for love nor money, he’d get into the bookshop and greet Liam with a frustrated sigh, only to log onto Twitter and see a new photo of his face on Harry’s Twitter feed, accompanied by some new snarky comment or other. Louis wouldn’t even _see_ where Harry was to take such photos. The guy must be a ninja, he swore.

Their photo war had garnered attention from thousands of people by now. Mere seconds after one of them had tweeted, the comments and replies and retweets would come flooding in, squealing about how adorable they were together, or how clearly they had some kind of love-hate thing going on.

Louis ignored all these comments as best he could.

After all, he hadn’t actually _spoken_ to Harry in the better half of two weeks. They shared a rushed hello on the film set, if they happened to both be free at the same time, but more often than not Harry would be mid-filming when Louis called in, or Louis would be rushing apologetically to work when Harry was leaning against the wall, waiting for him. They hadn’t exchanged any more private messages, either. The only time Louis interacted with him at all was through snarky comments with their photos on Twitter.

Louis sighed, running a hand down his face as he settled into his sofa for the evening. Re-heated pizza was his dinner – between work, his PhD (yes, he’d finally started on that thesis), and sneaking pictures of Harry, Louis had no time for cooking. His laptop was open in front of him, the familiar mix of nerves and excitement curling around in his stomach as he hovered over Twitter. Louis hadn’t had a chance to check his feed since he’d posted his most recent picture of Harry that morning.

He logged on, his lower lip caught between his teeth as he scanned through the responses to his tweet. Things had got to the point where he recognised several of the usernames now – the more dedicated fans who must stalk Harry’s page every time they got a spare second in their day. Louis admitted to clicking on a few of their profiles – just to see a bit more about who these people were that seemed so intent on following his weird kind-of … _thing_ … with a famous actor.

Louis shook his head. Even _thinking_ those words still felt wrong.

Sure enough, some of the more familiar usernames showed up with their responses. A few new Twitter handles had turned up as well, shoving their names together. ‘LouisAndHarry’ was apparently a thing now.

Louis was mature enough to admit that he quite liked the way their names seemed to run together so naturally.

_@fanofStyles:_ _there is literally no morning I don’t wake up to a new photo @Harry_styles @lwt91 pls stop_

_@HarryandLouisStyles:_ _I’m betting on a summer wedding @lwt91 @Harry_styles_

_@Harrygirl98:_ _Louis did he notice you taking this one? @lwt91 @Harry_styles_

Louis paused at the last one, gnawing on his lower lip. Not many of the tweets mentioned him directly, and he’d never responded to any before, unlike Harry. But maybe now he could change that. After all, if Harry spoke to them about him, then he should be able to repay the favour, right? And most of them had started following him directly, too. (His follower count had hit levels he’d never even _dreamed_ ).

Louis clicked on the reply button, feeling a little weird about responding to someone he literally didn’t know.

_@lwt91:_ _@Harrygirl98 nope. harry wishes he could best my skills_

It was posted before Louis had too much time to think on it, and he pushed his laptop away, shoving his knuckles in his mouth and emitting a small squeak. Whatever new step he took, he always felt mildly terrified. But nothing too bad could come from this, right?

Right?

Louis didn’t have long to wallow, though, because soon enough a notification popped up that made his eyes widen. It wasn’t like any of the other usual replies – this one was from Harry.

Harry had seen his tweet, and was replying? Right now? So he was online right now?

Louis snatched his laptop back, hastily clicking onto Harry’s profile.

_@Harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 @Harrygirl98 I’ll have you know my skills are far superior to yours, Tomlinson ;)_

There were already replies flooding through to that, mostly capital letter screaming for the moment. But Louis felt his stomach squirm when he realised that most of the replies were loudly exclaiming how this was ‘next-level flirting’.

Louis gave his head a shake. There was no way. He’d been _over_ this – Harry was more than likely straight, and he’d been seen with his co-star from ‘ _Kiwi,_ and even if he was somehow single and also interested in boys then he’d only rated Louis an 8 and so clearly he’d never be interested.

And even if he _was_ interested, Louis was far too busy with his work to actually consider dating Harry, even though they would quite honestly be cute togeth—

_Stop._

Louis dragged his thoughts away with a grimace. He’d had enough of overthinking every single little moment with Harry. Louis was _tired._ He didn’t want to be in the public eye, he didn’t want to be constantly questioning his motives, and he didn’t want to always be second-guessing Harry. He just wanted to get on with his quiet, peaceful, normal life, a world away from Harry Styles.

Just, irritatingly, Harry was actually quite good fun.

Louis gnawed on his lip. In another life, he thought he and Harry would have made good friends. At least. They played off each other, and he liked Harry’s company, and endlessly teasing him with stupid photos on the internet had somehow managed to become Louis’s favourite part of the day. Only, there was too much scrutiny all the time. Louis didn’t like it.

He wanted to put this whole thing to bed, once and for all.

So, pushing away the last vestiges of his morals, Louis opened up a new tab and typed in _‘Harry Styles boyfriend’._ Perhaps predictably, there were no results. Just google flashing up with _did you mean ‘Harry Styles_ ** _girl_** _friend’._

Well if that wasn’t a kick in the teeth.

With a sigh and trepidation twisting in his gut, Louis clicked on the suggestion, and the new search went through. The same articles as before came flashing up, but this time, Louis dug a little deeper. He hunted through the various trashy tabloid articles, wrinkling his nose at some of the more inane comments, until finally he clicked on one that was fairly recent and seemed reasonably reputable.

Dated just a week ago, the article was titled ‘Styles and Wilde: still picture-perfect?’ Underneath ran a short report, accompanied by some old photos of Harry and his co-star from _Reckless_.

_**Styles and Wilde: still picture-perfect?** _

_It’s a well-known fact how miserable all ‘Kiwi’ fans were at the break-up of co-stars Harry Styles and Olivia Wilde. All seemed so rosy for the perfect couple, until distance and filming seemed to take them away from each other’s arms._

Louis resisted the urge to snort. He scrolled passed several photos of the couple, clearly from a couple of years ago – Harry’s hair was shorter than that now, and the actress had a radiant smile but looked exactly the way she had in ‘ _Kiwi_. He ran through the article quickly, trying to ignore the squirming feelings that _maybe he was a stalker_ running through his stomach until he reached the end of the article. There was a picture of Harry and the same actress, but this time – this time, it was much more recent. Harry’s hair was short, the way it was now. And they were – wait, Louis _knew_ the background to that photo. That was the entrance to one of the swankiest hotels in the centre of Doncaster.

_But it seems all hope may not be lost! Fans of the super-couple were going crazy when this photo was released over social media. It seems to show Styles in his new location, where he’s filming for the much-hyped ‘Don’t Worry Darling’. Wilde, however, has no business being there other than – dare we hope – a reunion with Styles? Perhaps these two are just as lovestruck as they ever were._

_Keep your eyes peeled, super-fans. It may just be that this love story hasn’t quite reached its end._

Louis felt as if he’d been punched in the stomach.

He leaned back, too stunned to move his laptop off his knees, instead just watching as it slid down onto the floor. Harry – Harry was getting visited by his old co-star. And sure, maybe it didn’t mean anything, after all friends met friends all the time, but – but Doncaster was _quite a way_ from London, where Louis assumed this actress was staying. Would she really have come all this way to see Harry if they were friends?

Of course, it didn’t even _matter,_ it wasn’t like it was any of Louis’s business. He had no claim over Harry. They’d had a couple of snarky conversations, and somehow accidentally found themselves in the middle of a photo war. That was all. There was nothing even _close_ to a real relationship between them, and the sooner Louis got his stupid head around that idea, then the faster he could move on with his real life.

His real life, which involved writing a PhD thesis, finally getting fully qualified, and helping out Liam in the bookshop. That was the life he’d made for himself, and he _liked_ it.

It was just – Louis was realising that something had maybe been missing from his life before. A Harry-sized hole, and then life had thrown a Harry at him to fill it. But that was foolish – there was nothing between them. And even if there ever could be – even is this Olivia Wilde hadn’t shown up – then Louis still wasn’t exactly sure what _kind_ of relationship he would want with Harry.

And Harry certainly wouldn’t want one with him.

No, it was all far too complicated. Better Louis just forget about it and start to move on.

And then – perfect timing – his phone buzzed.

**_Harry Styles:_ ** _Talked to the director. Your friend can come to set on Monday_

Louis stared at the phone for several minutes before throwing it onto the cushion beside him and releasing a loud groan. He flopped backwards, staring up at the ceiling. He was _trying_ to move on. But there was the small matter of a giant film set existing in his city. A giant film set that he’d somehow, miraculously, managed to get access to.

Plus, Zayn would kill him if Louis didn’t let him on at least once – not after the number of times Louis had sneaked in to snap a quick photo of Harry.

Alright, fine. Louis growled, forcing himself upright again and reaching for his phone. One last bloody trip to the film set, to get Zayn off his back.

But then he was putting Harry Styles behind him, once and for all.

\---

Zayn was, naturally, thrilled.

_“I CAN’T BELIEVE IT, MATE!”_ His voice was painfully loud as he shouted down the line, even as Louis held his phone at arm’s length. “You did it! YOU GOT ME ONTO THE FUCKING SET!”

“Your faith in me is astounding,” Louis grumbled. He held his phone face-up in his palm, watching as raindrops collected on its ancient, cracked surface. Doncaster was absolutely _miserable_ on Monday mornings.

“Hey, hey, I didn’t think you’d actually do it!” Zayn let out an ecstatic squeal. “I mean, I know you’ve been flirting with Styles, but…”

“Zee –“

“…Wait, you didn’t sleep with him to get me on, did you?”

“Zayn!” Louis made a noise of disgust, trying to hold back the shudder of revulsion that flooded through him.

“Right, right, sorry. I just.” Zayn laughed breathlessly. “This is _huge,_ Louis. ‘ _Don’t Worry Darling’._ It’s huge!”

Louis allowed himself a smile. Zayn’s excitement was almost worth putting up with all Harry Styles’ nonsense – almost. Although he was still dreading actually talking to him again.

Hopefully Harry would be too busy filming to notice them.

“Where are you?” Zayn’s voice asked, muffled by the lining of Louis’s hood.

Louis grimaced. “Walking towards the set.”

“How far?”

“I’m three streets away, calm down.”

“I know, it’s just,” Zayn let out a long breath, “I don’t think I’m actually brave enough to walk onto set alone, and you’ve done it before.”

And there was a weird thought. Louis being more comfortable on a film set than Zayn? That was certainly new.

“Well, stay calm,” Louis reassured him. “Nick’s lovely, and I’m sure he’ll let you play with his camera.”

“You think?”

“I mean, he let _me_ touch it, and you’re a lot more qualified than I am.”

Zayn’s yelp of excitement made Louis smile.

“I can’t stay long, though,” Louis warned. “Got work to get to.”

“Yes, yes, I know.” Zayn sounded breathless. “I just need you to walk me onto the set and introduce me and then you can disappear. Unless Harry Styles catches you.”

Louis’s face dropped. “I told you not to bring that up.”

“Yes,” Zayn was snickering, “Yes you did.”

Louis huffed. He crossed the last street and hurried up the pavement until he found himself back by the familiar ROAD CLOSED sign. There were only a couple of other people there, and none of the actors were waiting, which made a nice change. Zayn was wrapped up in a giant coat to match the brilliance of his smile as he waved at Louis.

Louis slid his phone back into his pocket, grunting as he approached. “Don’t embarrass me.”

“Look at you, with all your posh contacts.” Zayn gave a theatrical sigh. “What happened to that shy prat from uni?”

Louis elbowed him in the ribs as he went up to the sign, sidestepping it easily. Zayn followed him with a moment’s hesitation. Louis could practically _hear_ the nerves jumping around in his friend’s stomach, and he laid a calming hand on Zayn’s shoulder, remembering all too well how nervous he was when he’d first set foot on this set in the wake of Harry Styles.

The machines were still whirring, and the lights were set up as they had been, but the fancy vintage car prop had gone. In its place, a few fake trees reached up to the sky, with more greenery strewn around and a whole forest’s worth of leaves scattered across the road. Louis held a finger to his lips as they approached, and Zayn nodded, his eyes wide and awestruck. Louis could see him staring hungrily at the cameras.

They lurked in the back of the set, making as little noise as possible. Filming was going on, but it was focused on the blonde actress again – Louis _really_ needed to learn her name – and only one of the male co-stars. It wasn’t Harry. Louis resisted the urge to stare into every corner of the set to spot the familiar flop of brown hair he’d come to recognise so well.

For their Twitter war, of course.

Instead, Louis focused on Nick, who he could see crouching behind one of the cameras. Louis nudged Zayn’s side and pointed him out silently, and Zayn’s eyes popped wide. Louis couldn’t help but grin. It was totally worth coming back here just to see his expression.

The scent of damp leaves filled the air, and that coupled with the props honestly made Louis wonder if he’d been somehow transported to some kind of forest. With the smoke obscuring Doncaster’s tall, modern buildings, he could almost believe it. Only the frantic disarray of wires and cameras told him that they were just on a film set.

Once the director called the end of the scene, a flurry of movement started up from everywhere as costume and make-up descended on the actors. Louis grasped Zayn’s arm and tugged him across to Nick.

Nick glanced up at their approach, beaming when he saw Louis. He clapped him on the shoulder and cheerily asked him how he was, and Louis answered with a small smile and slight disbelief that he’d somehow got onto such friendly terms with one of the industry’s biggest cameramen.

“And this is my friend,” Louis introduced once the niceties were out of the way, beckoning Zayn forward. “Zayn, he’s an employee at a local film company.”

“Oh, really?” Nick looked him up and down, his interest piqued. “What do you do?”

“Mostly just basic filming right now,” Zayn replied, airy and confident as ever. Louis almost forgot how nervous his best friend had been just minutes earlier.

“They got you on adverts, that kind of thing?”

Zayn made a face, and Nick laughed. “I’ve been there, kid. But I’m guessing you know your way around a camera. Want to come see how mine works?”

Zayn’s eyes almost popped with excitement, and Nick laughed again, beckoning him over to his camera.

Louis took a step back, watching with a smile. He couldn’t help but feel warm as he watched his best friend get acquainted with Nick, playing with the technology, a giant grin never leaving his face. It had been too long since Louis had been able to do something for Zayn. Honestly, he found himself wishing sometimes that they’d never moved out of their uni accommodation – as terrible as it had been, at least they’d had each other. These days, it felt like they hardly ever got to see each other.

Louis backed into the shadows when the actors were called back on set. He had a few minutes left until he had to leave for work, and Nick seemed to have decidedly taken Zayn under his wing, so his job was done. He’d just watch for a while, maybe try to sneak another photo of Harry, and then head on over to the bookshop.

It was then that he spotted Harry lurking in the corner opposite him, watching Louis with a small smile.

Louis nearly jumped. As it was, he clutched an exaggerated hand to his chest and sent Harry a glare, which was returned with a smirk. Harry waved his phone at Louis triumphantly.

Louis rolled his eyes.

Harry pushed away from the wall, making his silent way across the set. Louis shifted to make space for him by the wall, watching his approach with slight trepidation. He just had to remember the article from earlier. Harry wasn’t available. Their interactions meant nothing passed a bit of fun between – maybe – friends.

“Tomlinson,” Harry grinned, taking his place against the wall beside Louis.

Louis jerked his head in response, eyeing Harry’s phone with worry. “How zoomed-in were you this time?”

“You’ll find out later,” Harry snickered. Their voices were low, not wanting to disturb the filming that was starting up again just a little further up the street. Louis flicked a glance to the set, watching as the blonde actress took up her place, a male actor by her side. Their costumes were thin and flimsy – must be miserable in this weather.

Harry, on the other hand, was bundled up in a giant black coat with the hood pulled right up, covering all of his costume. His eyes were the same as ever, though, dancing at Louis with an amused smirk twisting his lips. “I was starting to think you were avoiding me.”

“Excuse me?” Louis huffed. “I take offence. I’ve had a stalkerish picture of you on my Twitter feed every single day, thank you very much.”

Harry chuckled. “You’re at the level of any tabloid paper, then.”

Louis grimaced. A memory of the article he’d read flitted through his mind again, sinking to the bottom of his stomach and weighing down his limbs. He resolutely pushed any thoughts of it away. He had nothing to be jealous of. He and Harry were just – maybe – _friends_. And Harry had Olivia Wilde.

“Besides,” Harry was continuing, his voice pitched low, “You haven’t been coming to talk to me.”

Louis gave a slightly guilty smile. “You were always acting, and then I had to rush off to work. Speaking of which. How did you even get half those photos of me?”

“You aren’t a difficult person to follow,” Harry answered breezily.

“Oh?”

“Nope, I remember you said something once about where you work, and there are only so many bookshops along the bus route.”

Louis blinked. Harry had actually put that much effort into finding him? Why – just to keep up their stupid little photo war? Not that he was complaining. He was just – well – surprised.

“You know, I think I’m definitely winning,” Harry mused aloud.

Louis glared at him. “How so?”

“Well, you’ve only ever got photos of me from here,” Harry gestured expansively around the film set, “Which requires, like, zero effort. I, on the other hand, have traipsed around half the city just to snap a picture of you staggering under a pile of books. So.”

Louis spluttered. “I do not _stagger_!”

“I have a lot of evidence to say otherwise.”

“I hate you, Harry,” Louis huffed, folding his arms. “Like, really. So much hatred.”

Harry just chuckled. “That’s no way to speak to the person who got your friend on set, is it?”

“You’re never going to let that go, are you?”

“Probably not.”

“Figures.” Louis let out a long-suffering sigh, shifting slightly against the damp wall. The constant drizzle was beginning to seep through his coat. “Speaking of, I think Nick likes Zayn.”

“Yeah?” Harry turned with mild interest to where Louis pointed them out, watching. Nick was back behind the camera, filming the scene, with Zayn at his shoulder watching his every move closely. Even from here, the beaming smile on Zayn’s face was obvious.

“Huh,” Harry hummed. “Looks like they’re happy.”

Louis allowed himself to look proud. “Yep. Zee’s been badgering me to get him on here for weeks.”

“Well, I’m glad I could be of assistance.” Harry slid him a tight-lipped smile. “You’re welcome, by the way.”

Louis returned the look with a small smile. “Thanks for allowing the peasants onto your set, Harry.”

“It’s a hard job, believe me.”

“I’m sure.” Louis chuckled, and Harry joined in. They leaned against the wall together, watching the filming in comfortable silence. The rain still fell in a mist around them, soaking into the air. Harry pulled his phone out and fiddled with it for a while, Louis watching with a suspicious glance. He was soon caught back up by the film set, though, watching as the scenes spread out before them. Zayn was talking excitedly to Nick, who smiled and nodded along and stepped aside to allow Zayn another look at the camera.

“Look,” Harry said suddenly, chuckling. “The fans seem to like my new picture.”

“Excuse me?” Louis span around, and Harry tilted his phone so Louis could see, a smug smile lifting his lips.

Louis peered at Harry’s pristine phone screen, narrowing his eyes. Harry’s Twitter feed was open, a constant flood of notifications lighting up the top of his screen. Louis was a little blown away by the numbers, even with his own recent introduction to the world of celebrity Twitter. He tapped onto Harry’s profile, narrowing his eyes when the first thing that popped up was a new photo of Louis’s face, zoomed right in.

Louis huffed, glaring at Harry. “Flattering.”

“Right?” Harry took his phone back with a snicker. “They seem to like it, anyway.”

“I’ll get you back.”

“You could,” Harry agreed mildly, “Or we could do something to _really_ make the fans explode.”

Louis’s stomach twisted. Suspicion was instantly at the forefront of his mind, so he narrowed his eyes at Harry, edging a little away from the wall.

“I don’t know where your mind instantly went,” Harry snorted, “But I meant we could take a photo together. You know, show them that we are actually friends.”

_Friends._ Louis’s chest warmed. He couldn’t let that show, though, so instead he painted a smirk onto his face. “Friends? What on earth gave you that idea?”

“Shut up.” Harry elbowed him, then stepped closer again. He was suddenly right in Louis’s space, their arms brushing, Harry’s slightly-damp coat seeping against Louis’s hand, and it was so unusual for Louis to have someone taller than him in his space. Harry lifted his phone with a raised brow. “What do you say?”

Louis licked his lips and reminded his brain how to work. “Uh – yeah? We could. Do that.”

Harry grinned and lifted the phone again. “Say cheese, then, Tomlinson.” And then Harry’s arm was around his shoulders, and his face was right by Louis’s, and suddenly Louis didn’t have to fake the smile that sprang to his lips.

Harry pressed the button a few times, until he had a selection to choose from. When he lowered his phone, he didn’t move out of Louis’s space, so Louis just leaned back against Harry’s arm and peeked over as Harry swiped through the photos.

Louis narrowed his eyes. “Do you take that many every time?”

“Usually, yeah.”

“I shudder to think how many unflattering photos of me you must have, then.”

“Oh, you don’t even _know,_ Tomlinson.” Harry chuckled.

Louis groaned.

“Don’t worry, though,” Harry added in a low voice, “It’s hard for you to look bad.”

Louis blinked.

_No,_ he reminded himself. _Olivia Wilde. Visited him. You’re a nobody._

“Though I think you’re improved by proximity to me.” Harry pulled up his chosen photo of the two of them and showed Louis with a proud smile. “We look good together, don’t we?”

Trouble was, Harry was _right_ – the selfie was good. They were both grinning, and Harry’s eyes were sparkling with so much _warmth._ Even Louis’s usually pallid face was glowing, pressed up right next to Harry.

Harry leaned against Louis’s side a little pulling him closer and opening up Twitter again. “I’m gonna post it now, speak if you have any objections.”

“Um.” Louis struggled to make his voice sound through a squeak. “No, I – no problem.”

“Good.” Harry sent him a sunny grin. “It’s not often I get a fit guy in a picture with me.”

Ok, but how on earth was Louis supposed to take _that_?

Something in his expression must show his inner turmoil, because Harry stepped away a little, and instantly the space beside Louis felt cold. Harry slid his phone back into his pocket and turned towards the set, a small smile still playing about his lips. “Anyway. I think they need me in a minute, so I’d better…”

“Yeah, sure,” Louis rushed, but he managed a weak smile in return. “I’ll, um. I don’t want to keep you.”

“You weren’t, don’t worry.” Harry held his gaze for another moment. He turned away with a small smirk. “Come back to pick up your friend later, don’t want to forget and leave him stranded!”

“Whatever,” Louis muttered.

Harry just laughed as he walked away.

Louis watched him until he was lost in the haze of smoke, and then firmly shook his head. He couldn’t afford to read anything into what Harry had said – aside from them being friends. That was nice. Harry Styles was his friend. That was something Louis could get behind.

And it explained the warm squishy feeling in his chest whenever Harry was around. There was absolutely no need to read any more into things.

_Olivia Wilde,_ Louis reminded himself savagely on the long, damp walk to work. _She’s Harry’s. Olivia Wilde. Olivia Wilde._

But that didn’t stop him from saving the selfie as soon as he had access to the internet again.

…

Louis’s day was long, and dull, and there was honestly very little to do at the bookshop. Louis spent the majority of his time with his long limbs folded up into an armchair in the corner, occasionally tending to the few customers who came in during the day, and reading Zayn’s increasingly excited texts from the film set.

**Z:** **LOU GUESS WHAT**

**Z:** THEY ACTUALLY LET ME FILM A BIT

**Z:** I mean they’ll probably cut it out but I filmed something! With real actors!!!

**Z:** I owe you so much weed for this

Louis couldn’t resist a slight laugh. He made a mental note to take Zayn up on that offer, though probably not all at once. Louis leaned back in his chair with a sigh. Notes for his thesis were scattered around him, along with a few books he’d been half-heartedly flipping through and calling it ‘research’, but his mind had been fighting him all day. He was trying to work, but all his brain seemed to be interested in was throwing random memories of TV shows at him, or reminding him that he hadn’t called his mum in a few days, and he needed to check that he had a present for his Aunt’s birthday next week.

By the time the end of the day rolled around, Louis left the bookshop with the heavy, frustrated feeling of having wasted the day. He’d dared to open up Twitter just before leaving, but the amount of notifications had completely exploded his (admittedly rather ancient) phone, and he’d had to give up before he had a chance to read any of the comments on his and Harry’s new photo.

Not that he cared at all. Harry could do what he liked.

_Olivia Wilde,_ Louis reminded himself again as his feet carried him back onto the film set. Zayn had promised to be waiting for him, but he wasn’t by the ROAD CLOSED sign, so Louis assumed he’d still be camped out with Nick.

As Louis approached the ROAD CLOSED sign, a few other people that were gathered there turned to look at him, and he heard a gasp. Before he knew it, a young girl was standing his path, her friend beside her, both their eyes wide as they stared up at him.

Louis blinked.

“Is it…” the first of them breathed, “Is it – you?”

“Um…” Louis tilted his head.

“It is! I’m sure of it! You’re Louis Tomlinson!”

“No way!” Her friend squealed, grabbing for her phone.

“It is, look! He’s got the same hair!” The first girl stared up at him. “It is you, isn’t it?”

Louis managed a weak smile and a nod.

“I knew it!” She squealed again. “Oh, are – are you on your way to see Harry Styles?!”

“Um.” Louis spluttered a little, but before he could say anything else she was speaking again.

“No, sorry, it’s none of my business, it’s just –” she took a breath. “—I really love the photos you’ve been posting. They’re so hilarious, you’ve really brightened my mornings.”

“Oh.” Louis’s smile didn’t waver that time. “Well, I’m - I’m glad you’re enjoying it?”

“I really am!” She grabbed her friend’s arm and they both sent him a final sunny smile. “But anyway, um – we shouldn’t take up your day, just. It was – it was really, really great to meet you!”

“Um, you too.” Louis smiled again, wondering if he should thank them, or offer them a hug, or something? He never in a million years thought he’d be the sort of person to get requests like that, or even recognised. He shook his head, a little dazed, and ended up just sidestepping around them and heading up past the ROAD CLOSED sign towards the film set.

Zayn was still with Nick, but Harry Styles was leaning against the wall again, watching him with a small smile.

Louis approached him, still looking slightly dazed. “I just ran into some of your fan club.”

Harry raised both brows.

“They recognised me,” Louis huffed out in amazement. “ _Me_?!”

Harry grinned at him. “Aw, Louis, you’re growing up.”

“Shut up, Styles.”

“Well, I mean,” Harry pushed off the wall and approached him, smirking, “It’s hardly surprising, is it? You’ve been feeding their stalking for ages.”

“You started it,” Louis reminded him mildly.

“True.” Harry’s grin got wider. “They’ve only got more keen today, as well.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, apparently a lot of them _really_ liked our selfie.” Harry fished his phone out of his pocket. “Didn’t you look?”

“Haven’t had a chance,” Louis answered honestly.

Harry shuddered. “I can’t imagine working somewhere you _can’t check the internet_ whenever you want.”

“Well, we’re not all spoiled actors, are we?”

“Oi.” Harry had Twitter open by now, showing Louis the endless flood of notifications. “I was being nice to you – you could return the favour.”

Louis widened his eyes, fixing Harry with an innocent stare. “Oh, light of my life, you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

“That’s more like it.”

Louis snorted, elbowing Harry’s side as he stepped up to look at his phone. Harry was right – this photo was their most retweeted yet, and there was an endless flood of comments flowing down from it, emanating from fangirlish squeals to repeated mentions of _‘just kiss already’_.

Louis couldn’t help but feel his cheeks heat up a little. He and Harry had never actively talked about the shipping going on behind their little photo war – Louis knew Harry must be aware of it, even if he’d never actively acknowledged it before now. And Louis had spent far too many hours combing through the endless flood of replies, wondering just what _exactly_ it was he and Harry were doing to spark so much speculation.

“I admire their dedication,” Louis finally settled on saying, struggling to keep his voice even.

Harry chuckled. “That’s one way to put it. My favourites are when they start yelling at us for being too cute – if only they knew the truth, huh?”

Louis glanced at him. “What, that all we really do all day is bicker?”

“That, and me making you blush,” Harry answered breezily.

Louis spluttered. “ _When_ have you _ever_ –”

“Don’t deny it, Tomlinson,” Harry challenged, “I saw your face this morning after I called you fit.”

Louis’s spluttering only increased.

“And, see, you’re doing it again now.” Harry’s tone was teasing, and he sidled right up into Louis’s space, his body warm in the cold evening air.

Louis’s head was basically a confused mush of scrambled thoughts by this point. He should back away from Harry – he should _really back away,_ because Olivia Wilde was a thing, and she’d been in Doncaster to visit him, and Harry was more than likely straight anyway because in all of Louis’s hunting through articles about him there had never, ever, not even once, been a mention of a guy.

“What is it, Louis?” Harry’s tone sounded oddly tender, and Louis jumped when a hand closed around his forearm.

“Olivia Wilde,” Louis blurted out.

The reaction was instantaneous. Harry drew back in shock, his mouth falling open slightly. “ _Excuse me?”_

“Sorry. I just—That’s who you’re with, right?” Louis stared determinedly at the floor as he spoke. “Olivia Wilde. The one from ‘ _Kiwi_. I read –”

“Olivia’s not been up here in ages.”

“But I thought I saw in the paper…”

“Tabloid trash,” Harry shrugged easily, his eyes shimmering. He sent Louis an appraising glance. “Have you been reading up on me, Tomlinson?”

“No!” Louis was quick to deny, his words tumbling over themselves. “Of course not, how could you be so – why would I – no!”

“If you say so.” Harry was full-on grinning by now. His expression was the worst kind of arrogant, caught right on the edge stupidity.

Louis huffed, glaring down at his toes. There was no way Harry knew his internet history. He was still safe – he had to be. His stalkerish habits remained hidden.

“Well,” Harry added after a moment of silence, and Louis cursed in his head. He _knew_ that tone. That was Harry’s I-know-more-than-you-think stupid arrogant drawl. “If you _have_ been reading up on me, then you should know – I don’t tell the press about the guys.”

Louis’s heart hammered in his throat.

“I mean,” Harry shrugged lightly, “It’s not that I’m ashamed, or anything, it’s just – the press can be really horrible towards bi people, and I don’t really want to deal with it.”

Louis was struggling to digest all this new information. Olivia Wilde was, apparently, maybe not a thing – at least not in the way Louis thought. And Harry was – Harry was –

“So you’re bi?” Louis blurted out again, instantly cursing his lack of tact.

Luckily, Harry was grinning as he answered. “Obviously. I did just tell you that.”

“Well, yes, it’s just.” Louis shook his head, stopping to think for a minute before he spilled too much. “Um. I didn’t know – I didn’t know that was a thing. And I hadn’t seen you say it anywhere.”

“No, well, you wouldn’t, because I haven’t.”

“And you’re not with Olivia Wilde?”

“Not anymore.” Harry tilted his head, his eyes dancing at Louis. “A couple of years ago – and I shouldn’t even be surprised you know who she is, you’re such a fan of ‘ _Kiwi_ –”

“Shut up.”

“—But clearly you missed the bit where we broke up and I moved up here for this job.”

Louis huffed. “I didn’t know you were together, actually. I just looked it up – that is, um I mean – I read it, only then it looked like she’d been up visiting you –”

“Ages ago,” Harry clarified, and he was _definitely_ laughing now.

“Oh.”

“Like, before I met you, ages ago.”

“Oh.”

“So you honestly have nothing to worry about.”

Louis spluttered.

“And you can go back to googling me in safety,” Harry added with another amused grin.

Louis glared at him. “I was not –”

“Don’t bother trying to deny it, Tomlinson, I know where my interviews go.”

Louis closed his eyes and drew in a calming breath. He could deal with this insufferable brat. He _could._ And maybe his insides were squirming just a little bit with this new knowledge, even though he firmly told them to stop. So Harry was bi. That didn’t change anything. Honestly. It didn’t.

“Anyway,” Harry continued when he was done chuckling, “So I’m assuming from all this that you’re gay.”

Louis nearly choked.

“I mean, feel free to correct me,” Harry hurried to add, his hands up, “I’m all for meeting other bi people –”

“Yeah, actually,” Louis gasped when he could speak again, his face feeling far too hot.

Harry’s smile returned, and he walked closer to Louis. “Yeah, I’m gay.”

Harry opened his mouth to speak but right at that very moment Louis felt a pair of arms wrap around his waist. He turned around to a very excited Zayn hugging him close, and Nick standing right beside them. Zayn unwrapped his arms from his best friend, turning excitedly to face him.

“I love you so much Lou! Today was amazing!”

Louis chuckled at the excited grin on his best friend’s face. “I’m glad Zee.”

“He’s a natural,” Nick commented. “Might have to snatch him up and have him come work for me.”

Zayn’s eyes widened as he sputtered out a few thanks. Louis’ eyes darted to Harry, expected to be greeted with the same grin that he was wearing. Instead, Harry looked… _uncomfortable._ His eyes were turned away from Louis and he was playing with his rings subtly. Louis tried to make eye contact, but either Harry didn’t notice him, or he was purposely ignoring him. Louis didn’t know what changed in the few minutes between their last conversation and now, but whatever it was, he didn’t like it.

He quickly turned over to where Zayn was still with Nick, chatting about something clearly exciting. Louis hated to interrupt them, but his stomach was roiling with confusion, and more than anything he wanted to go home and have a chat with Zayn about his newfound feelings. Not that he was feeling anything. He had zero feelings for Harry Styles.

Thankfully, Zayn took one look at his face and immediately excused himself from Nick. They were about to head out before Louis turned around to Harry quickly.

“Bye Harry. See you later?”

Harry gave him a tight smile and hummed. “Yeah, we’ll see.”

Zayn looked between them, confused, but Harry just gave another small smile before turning to walk off. “Glad you had fun today Zayn.”

Louis almost snorted. His mind was too much of a mess to sort this out right now. So, before Harry could say anything else, Louis turned around with Zayn and walked back out into the street.

He just needed to get home, back to where everything made sense.


	7. VII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kind of a short one for now, but drama filled!! (kind of) 
> 
> Feedback is always appreciated!! Once again, thanks for reading <3

Louis didn’t go back to the film set for a while. Instead, he spent his days actually working on his PhD, and without the distraction he was able to get the first few thousand words written with little to no difficulty. His research was going well – Liam had lent him a supply of books to keep him going, and he had the two city libraries to use as well – and Louis had high hopes for getting a good mark.

Zayn, on the other hand, was going to the film set every day. He’d hit it off with Nick, so much so that Nick had asked to see some of his portfolio (Louis had been graced with a particularly loud voice message when that happened). Apparently, he was going to show them to the director eventually. Zayn was making strides in his career.

Louis, on the other hand, tried to think as little about the film set as possible. He’d only been absent for a few days, but already, Twitter was questioning his sudden disappearance. Zayn had somberly informed him that the hashtag ‘ _wheresLouis’_ was trending in the UK for a while, and there were countless questions flooding both his and Harry’s account.

Harry, apparently, was also completely ignoring the issue. He’d gone back to Tweeting his usual mundane daily life, things like _Look at the giant muffin I had for breakfast!_ And _Raining in Doncaster AGAIN, guess people weren’t lying about the climate here._

Louis didn’t care, though. Harry could do what he liked.

Honestly, he wasn’t even sure why he was annoyed. He _wasn’t_ annoyed, not really. He was just confused about what had happened and what he had done to piss off Harry in such a short span of time. Somehow though, Harry knew all about Louis googling him, stalking his various internet interviews, and his sexuality. They were _friends._ Yet, he was being ignored.

Louis groaned. He fell back into his covers, hiding his face in a pillow. He had a day off from the bookshop, so he hadn’t bothered with getting out of bed, preferring to drag all his PhD books under the blankets with him. Rain had been pounding against his windows all day, and all in all, Louis was about ready to start climbing the walls of his tiny flat.

That was, until a knock sounded at his door.

Louis instantly went into full alert mode. He shot up from under his blankets, staring straight at the door with narrowed, suspicious eyes. He really couldn’t think of why anyone would be visiting him right now. And Zayn never knocked.

The knock sounded again a few minutes later.

Cautiously, Louis clambered up to his feet. He peeked through the peephole, eyes widening at what he saw.

Harry Styles was standing in the corridor.

How on earth? Harry Styles didn’t even know where he _lived._

Louis considered getting back into bed and pretending he hadn’t heard anything, but a third knock sounded, and something in Louis’s stomach twisted. Harry looked nervous through the peephole, his teeth caught in his lower lip. And, well, in the few days that Louis hadn’t seen him, a strange emptiness had taken hold in his chest.

Louis gave in and opened the door.

“I’m sorry,” Harry said before the door was even fully open. He had a bag of Yorkshire Tea – Tesco’s finest – and he was wearing a sheepish smile. “I was a dick, and I’m sorry, and I just –“

“Harry.” Louis held up a hand to stop him, and despite himself there was a smile twitching his lips. “Not a conversation for the doorstep.”

Harry looked up at him, all open edges and soft looks. “Sorry. Um. Can I come in?”

“How did you even find where I live?”

“Zayn told me.”

“Of course he did.” Louis lifted his eyes upwards. Zayn would never stop taking it upon himself to try and fix Louis’s problems.

Harry shifted on his feet, his lower lip caught back between his teeth. “Shouldn’t he have? I’m sorry, um, if you don’t want me here I can go –”

Louis deliberated for half-a-second, in which Harry’s expression dropped, but then he stepped aside with another small smile. “No, it’s alright, you can come in.”

Harry’s face instantly brightened again. Louis tried to ignore the weird flip in his chest at that.

Louis got Harry settled on the sofa, taking the tea from him and placing a tea bag each into two mugs. He swept most of his books and papers onto the floor and settled down beside Harry, trying to ignore the jumping nerves in his stomach. He and Harry had never been so alone like this before. Nobody around to distract them. Hell, Harry was in Louis’ _house._ He was feeling pretty terrified.

It helped that Harry looked fairly scared, too.

“I really am sorry,” Harry started hesitantly. “I really don’t know what came over me the other day, and I didn’t mean to brush you off, or ignore you for so long after. I mean, I’m usually never like that and it was pretty terrible of me. God, you probably think that all those rumours about me being a twat are right - ”

“Harry,” Louis stopped the jumbled flood of words with an upraised hand and a kind smile. “It’s ok.”

“It isn’t, though,” Harry continued earnestly. “Like, that was a really terrible thing for me to do –”

“It’s ok.”

“—And I should have just communicated –”

“Harry.” Louis placed a gentle hand on his thigh. Harry stilled immediately. “Harry, really. It’s ok. I promise you, I’m not that offended. We all have bad days.”

Harry shifted in his grip. “But you haven’t been back on set.” Harry sighed. “I thought you wouldn’t want to talk to me again after I was kind of a wanker.” Harry was staring steadfastly down at the ground, and his voice still trembling a little with nerves. He didn’t look much like the arrogant Harry Styles that Louis had always assumed he was. No, this Harry just looked – small. And maybe a little bit lost.

Louis let out a gusty sigh. “Ok, maybe I was avoiding you a little bit.”

Harry’s face screwed up.

“But I overreacted, I think. I was just a bit confused,” Louis hastened to add, “And trust me, I’m not mad at you Haz.”

“Haz?” All traces of nerves were gone from Harry’s voice, replaced with playfulness and slight mischief. There was the tiniest glimmer of hope that played on Harry’s features.

It was Louis’s turn to look down. “Just – I – well.” He mumbled.

Harry’s loud laugh boomed in Louis’ small flat. “Aww _Lou_ ,” he cooed. “We’re on nickname basis! I guess you really do forgive me!” A full-blown grin was now adorning his face, and Louis found it hard to even pretend to be annoyed. Harry looked absolutely adorable.

“Shut up,” he mumbled back, his voice devoid of any real conviction. Harry’s grin only widened, and he kept his eyes fixed on Louis. A moment of comfortable silence hung between them. Harry stared at Louis, his fixed in a smile, his eyes soft. Louis kept his gaze resolutely on the spot of couch by his knees, refusing to look at Harry. He could still feel Harry’s warmth resonating from the other side of the sofa, though.

“Louis,” Harry eventually spoke, and his tone was far too soft and far too warm. “About the other day, I’m sorry if I kind of, y’know, _pressured_ you into telling me about your sexuality. I shouldn’t have forced you to tell me.”

“You didn’t –”

“Its none of my business,” Harry interrupted, and Louis finally looked up at him again. Harry was nibbling on his lower lip. “And – well – I mean, you’re only the second person I’ve told. So.”

Louis’s eyes widened a little. “You’ve only told two people you’re bi?”

Harry gave a sheepish nod. “Honestly, I didn’t exactly mean to tell you, either. But you looked really confused, and I knew you’d never find out from googling me –”

The back of Louis’s neck grew hot.

“—So I figured I’d just tell you,” Harry finished. He ducked his head a little. “I mean, I don’t _expect_ anything. I just – I wanted you to know that, well, guys aren’t exactly off-limits for me. Despite the press only knowing about the girls.”

Louis’s expression cleared a little. “If I can ask – um – obviously, you don’t have to tell me, but, why do you keep the guys hidden? If there, I mean, if there have been any.” Louis squeezed his eyes shut. _He was asking Harry Styles about his exes._ Why was this a thing? When had this ever become a part of Louis’s life?

Harry, for his part, smirked slightly. “Honestly, it just never came up. Interviewers don’t bother to ask – like, once you’ve been seen with a girl, that’s it, you know? Even if it wasn’t even that serious. No one assumed, so I didn’t say anything.”

Louis bit his lip, considering. “Sorry about that.”

“Why are you sorry?” Harry quirked a brow.

Louis shrugged. “Um, I just guess – it must suck to have people assuming that about you all the time. And I kind of assumed that, too, so…”

“Once you saw me with Olivia,” Harry’s expression cleared. He gave a small laugh. “Honestly, it was worth it to see you jealous.”

Louis spluttered. “I _was not…_ ”

“You don’t have to hide it from me,” Harry grinned at him, and there was his usual confidence glimmering through again. “I’m flattered, honestly. I meant it when I called you fit.”

Louis grew flustered all over again. His head was rattling with a confused mush of thoughts, a never-ending rush of muddled feelings clamouring over each other. He turned his eyes away and stared at the framed pictures on his wall. Anything to avert his gaze from _Harry Styles calling him fit._ He didn’t know what it meant, but, Louis liked Harry – he was slowly, gradually, coming to accept that. He _liked_ Harry Styles.

“Sorry.” Harry replied, following Louis’ gaze to the pictures on the wall. Louis wasn’t sure why, but Harry was looking all nervous again. “Sorry, I’m probably being a bit – well. Yeah, sorry, just ignore that.”

Louis tore his eyes away from the framed picture of him and Zayn hanging onto each other with giant smiles at their university graduation, and turned back to Harry with a barely concealed confused smile.

“And like I said, I don’t expect, um anything. Sorry if I’m coming on too strong or, um, something,” Harry hurried on.

Louis sent Harry an interested look and laughed.

“Don’t worry Haz, its fine. I’m just not used to _international movie stars_ waltzing into my flat and calling me fit. I’m flattered, really,” He grinned. Harry rolled his eyes.

“So, what are you used to then?” Harry sounded flustered for once. “I mean, in terms of people calling you fit.”

Louis confusion only deepened, “If you wanted to ask me about my dating history, all you had to do was ask.” Louis’ tone was something close to delighted.

Harry just glared at him, a slow blush rising to his cheeks. “So, like, yeah, that’s what I was asking.” Harry suddenly looked flustered again. “Obviously, we don’t have to talk about this, I can just go –”

Louis instantly closed a hand around Harry’s wrist.

Harry looked down at Louis’s hand on his skin, then back up at Louis, and then gave a small smile.

“I want to,” Louis said softly. “Talk, I mean. I’ve never really discussed it before-”

“Don’t worry,” Harry assured, his voice just as low. “I never have, either.”

Louis returned the smile, leaning back against the cushions in an effort to show he was relaxed. In reality, his heart was racing, and his head was throbbing with the thought that this was _Harry, in his flat, asking about his exes._

But then he looked at Harry, at this softer, sweeter, adorable Harry who looked like he was _genuinely_ interested in Louis’ life. And Louis knew they were ok.

“So.” Louis began, turning to face Harry. “Obviously my dating history isn’t as exciting as yours, what with all the models and celebrities- “Harry gave his thigh a small slap, “But- “Louis continued, “There’s not much really. I came out in secondary school and my mum was super accepting. I’m genuinely so grateful for her. For the longest while it was just her and me against the world y’know, so her accepting me meant the most.” He took a small breath and met Harry’s eyes again, now filled with something scarily close to adoration. Harry stayed quiet, and nudged Louis to continue. “Yeah so I had the occasional boyfriend in secondary school, but nothing really to write home about. And then uni came around and-“

“Zayn” Harry asked, an his brows raised inquisitively.

Well, Louis _had_ met Zayn in uni, if that’s what Harry meant. “Yeah.” He replied. “That’s when I met Zayn. And quite honestly, I dunno I never really had much time for serious relationships before. I’m the oldest of my siblings, so I had to help out my mum and the girls any way I could, and the twins were a _handful_ -”

“Twins?!” Harry exclaimed. His previously confused expression morphed into immediate delight. Louis found it absolutely adorable.

Louis nodded, a content smile overtaking him. He loved his family to bits, and always took any opportunity to talk about them. “Its complicated.” He laughed. “So Lottie is the second oldest after me, then there’s Fizz, and finally the twins Phoebe and Daisy who are just going into secondary school now.”

“That’s amazing!” Harry exclaimed. “I bet they’re wonderful!”

Louis gave him a lingering look. “They are, yeah. Lottie and Fizzy share a flat in London now. Lotts is trying to make it big as a makeup artist and Fizz is just finishing uni. The twins are back home with my mum finishing up school. I’m so insanely proud of all of them, and try to see them when I can.” Harry looked at him with absolute awe. “What about you?”

Harry snapped out of his adoring gaze, and bit his lip to contain his smile. “Not as many as you,” he laughed, “But yeah. One sister. Gemma. She’s older than me though. She was always my role model, looking after me with my mum and making sure I didn’t get into any dumb shit. She’s actually the reason I went into acting in the first place.”

“Yeah?” Louis asked, genuinely curious.

Harry smiled and continued. “Yeah. When we were in secondary school, she encouraged me to try out for our school play. She was in it the year earlier, and pushed me to try it too. I did and I’m _so glad._ I was hooked, and yeah. The rest is history, I guess. Harry slowly shook his head. “I love her to bits. She took me to my first proper audition too!”

Louis was smiling so wide he felt his cheeks might explode. Seeing Harry talk about his family sparked something so warm inside him, he didn’t know if it scared him yet.

“I try to see her and my mum as much as I can, but life gets pretty hectic now. I mean, one day I was walking around London with my family, and then suddenly _‘Kiwi’_ happened and my face was everywhere.”

Louis’s lips twitched. “You must have been devastated.”

Harry shoved him. Louis’s side felt warm where he’d touched.

“I mean, it was _weird._ Suddenly being everywhere.” Harry pursed his lips. “I mean – I didn’t _hate_ it, the attention is nice and people were saying good things about me, which is always nice. And things have only really got better since then. But now I can barely walk down a street without someone squealing and running over.”

“I’ve noticed,” Louis added blandly.

Harry shoved him again. Louis rubbed his side.

“I didn’t _ask_ for it,” Harry insisted plaintively, “You know that, right?”

Louis surveyed him. Harry, with his deliberately widened eyes, his floppy curly hair, his clothes – and for the first time they _were_ _his_ clothes, not a costume or an outfit carefully put together for the public. Harry, apparently, favoured fluffy jumpers and black trousers. Relaxed and lazy.

Harry squirmed under Louis’s gaze, so Louis was quick to reassure him. “I know. Or I think I do.”

“You think?” Harry quirked a brow.

Louis nodded. “I mean, sometimes you look like all you want is to hide in corners.”

“Accurate.”

“But then other times you deliberately start photo wars with me just to draw more attention.”

“Hey,” Harry lifted a finger, “That was not just to draw attention.”

“No?”

“Well, it was a bit more specific.” Harry glanced down at the sofa, bunching the fabric between his fingers. Louis almost stopped him before he dug a hole and Louis would have to deal with his landlord shouting. Somehow, _Harry Styles did it_ didn’t seem like a good enough excuse.

Louis pushed away the errant thoughts and asked, “Specific how?”

Harry’s fingers dug in tighter. Louis held back a wince. “I didn’t want _their_ attention. I just wanted yours.”

Louis’s eyes widened a little.

“Sorry,” Harry was quick to add, “I know that’s a bit – well. It must sound odd.”

“You sound odd generally.” Louis was a bit dazed.

Harry huffed out a laugh. “Says the guy who yelled at me the first time we met just because _no film could stand up to the book._ ”

If Louis’s brain hadn’t still been busy trying to wrap itself around Harry’s admission, he would have flushed. As it was, he simply said, still dazed, “I already apologised for that.”

“So you did.” Harry shook his head, but there was a smile at his lips. “Pretentious twat.”

Louis blinked. He came back to himself slightly, meeting Harry’s gaze. “So you were just after my attention?”

“Kinda,” Harry acquiesced. “Kinda have been this whole time, if I’m honest.”

Louis blinked again, more slowly this time.

Then Harry’s fingers were against his cheek, and Harry quietly hummed, “You really had no idea. And I thought I was being far too obvious.”

Louis didn’t dare to move. “Sorry. I’m not – I’m not very good at this stuff.”

“Trust me, you’re not that bad.”

“I –” Louis was about to reply when suddenly the front door was slammed open.

_“Lou??”_ Zayn’s voice rang out, loud and misplaced.

Harry’s eyes widened. And then his fingers were gone from Louis’s cheek, and Louis instantly missed his warmth.

Zayn walked into the room as confident as ever, immediately making his way to Louis kitchen and placing a few bags on the countertop. “Lou I brought takeout! Your favourite,” his back was towards Louis, _and Harry,_ as he continued. “I was thinking we could just have a lazy one tonight and-” He spun around. “Oh fuck. Hi Harry.”

Harry sent him a small smile that looked more like a grimace, but he kept his place on the sofa. “Hi Zayn.”

Louis frowned, his whole face screwing up, eyes closed and everything. He ran a distracted hand through his hair. “Hey Zee. Um Harry, do you want to stay for dinner or-”

Harry got hesitantly to his feet, his expression open and vulnerable. “Um. Actually, I just remembered I have to get to set in a few. Ok, well, you know I’m sorry, and you got the tea, so – so I’m just gonna…” He stumbled his way off Louis’s sofa, moving over towards the door. His footsteps seemed slow, reluctant almost. Louis wanted to stop him. Zayn watched the interaction silently from the kitchen.

He waited until Harry was all the way at the door, his fingers on the handle, before Louis spoke.

“Harry.”

Harry turned instantly.

“I’ll see you tomorrow?”

It took a moment for understanding to register on Harry’s face. Louis was torn between studying his reaction and running as fast as he could in the opposite direction. As it was, he settled for some kind of in-between, staring at the wall just a bit passed Harry’s head.

“Oh,” Harry said eventually, and Louis cursed himself. This was it, the moment Harry would walk out of Louis’s life for good.

“Yeah, um.” Harry said instead. His body was leaned towards the door handle, but his face was still turned towards Louis. “I’ll see you on the set?”

Louis finally made his mouth start working with his brain. “Yeah. Yeah, you’ll see me there.”

“Good. Great.” Harry paused, then sent Louis a small, true smile. It was probably the prettiest thing Louis had ever seen. “I’ll look forward to it.”

Louis watched Harry turn and say a quick bye to Zayn before walking out and closing the door closed behind him.


	8. VIII

True to his word, Louis turned up at the film set the next morning, balancing two mugs of coffee in his hands.

Zayn beat him there. Louis shouldn’t even have been surprised. Nick and Zayn had hit it off instantly, and with this being literally all that Zayn had ever wished for, Louis doubted even the four horsemen of the apocalypse could keep him away now he had a legitimate way in.

Zayn glared at the two coffee cups Louis was sporting. “Are you sure I can’t have _one_?”

“Nope.” Louis’s gaze was occupied elsewhere.

“You’re a monster.”

“Duly noted.”

Zayn sighed, following Louis’s gaze to the set where all five of the main characters were currently shooting what was apparently a very important scene. As a result, his and Louis’s conversation was being held in a rush of murmured whispers. “Three guesses who it’s actually for.”

Louis didn’t even look away to send him a tired glare. Instead, he was taking the opportunity to study Harry.

Harry, who was dressed up to the max in costume, with a handgun slung in his belt loops and a flowing black coat thrown back off his shoulders, dazzling in the limelight of the cameras. The others were with him, of course – the blonde actress Louis still hadn’t learned the name of, with another actress dressed up in what looked to be _very_ expensive jewelry, and two other men Louis had caught glimpses of before, but never been properly introduced to. He really should learn their names at some point.

It looked like Harry would be busy for a while, so Louis found a dark corner to huddle up in. He balanced the coffees on a ledge by his side, alternating between watching Harry and watching Zayn experiment with the camera under Nick’s direction. (Ultimately, though, he was watching Harry. He was proud of Zayn and all, but, well, _Harry_ ).

Since Harry left his flat the previous night, Louis had done little but think. Think about how much he’d learned about Harry in that one conversation, how much he knew now that hardly anyone else could know. Harry Styles had been sitting on his sofa. Harry Styles had shared more with Louis than Louis had ever expected. And Harry Styles knew something about Louis too.

Now, though, Harry Styles was back in his element, and Louis was getting to watch him. He could hardly waste this opportunity. And, well, he hadn’t participated in their photo war for a while.

The photo Louis snapped of Harry was really rather perfect. Harry was mid-speaking, so his mouth was open, and Louis had managed to figure out the zoom on his rather ancient phone, so he’d used it profusely. He tweeted the picture with a simple caption.

_@lwt91:_ _Styles never saw this one coming_

As expected, the response was instantaneous. Harry had shown Louis a way to connect to wifi at the film set a while ago (of course Harry had insisted that the set had internet access at all times), and he was relieved that the connection was faster than his one at home, seeing as the sudden flood of tweets was really rather overwhelming.

 _@Harrygirl342:_ LOUIS YOU’RE BACK I MISSED YOU

 _@HarryslittleLouis:_ Wow strong use of the zoom there, isn’t Harry going to kill you?

 _@charthefan:_ IT’S THE RETURN!!! #larry

Louis blinked. What the fuck was #larry? With a feeling of slight trepidation, he clicked on the little blue link, and flinched when it took him to a whole new Twitter tag page.

#larry was, apparently, a tag dedicated solely to the ship of Louis and Harry.

And it went on for pages. And pages.

Louis felt slightly faint.

Luckily, just then the director called cut, so Louis hastily shoved his phone deep back down inside his bag. He scooped up the coffees again, looking up, and waved Harry over as soon as he saw him.

Harry was searching the outskirts of the set as he moved away from his fellow actors, and his face brightened the moment he caught sight of Louis. Louis lifted a coffee cup in invitation. Harry didn’t hesitate to stride straight over to him, a smile caught at his lips.

“Oh my God, you’re my saviour,” was the Harry way greeted Louis as he all but snatched a coffee mug off Louis.

Louis arched a brow. “Good to know. Does that mean I can make you do whatever I say?”

“Depending on how good this is, I actually might agree to that.” Harry took a long sip and closed his eyes, letting out a sigh of appreciation.

Louis grinned. “Looks like I’ll be ordering you around, then.”

Harry didn’t answer him directly. Instead, he took another sip, saying dazedly, “You got my order exactly right.”

“Really?” Louis looked pleased with himself.

“Yep.” Harry narrowed his eyes, tone playful. “Have you been google stalking me again?”

Louis spluttered. Harry seemed entirely too pleased with himself, still grinning as he sipped again at the coffee. He had a little milk moustache. Louis decided he looked too endearing for his own good.

“Actually,” Louis huffed as soon as he could speak again, “I just got you what I usually order, so, lucky guess.”

Harry lifted one delicate brow. “You have good taste.”

“Normally I’d agree, except I seem to like you.”

“Rude.” Harry shook his head, but his lips were still quirked up. The expression suited him, Louis decided – as did the dark green of his shirt. It gave his emerald eyes an earthy glow.

Harry settled against the wall beside Louis, coffee clutched between the palms of his hands to warm them. The chill of winter was beginning to lift, but spring was arriving slowly – the air was still crisp and cold, and Louis was glad of the warmth of Harry beside him.

“So,” Harry began after a moment of silence, “I’m glad you came today.”

Louis looked at him quizzically. “I said I would, didn’t I?”

“Yeah, but I wasn’t sure.”

“Why not?”

Harry shifted a little, avoiding Louis’s gaze by looking down at their feet. “I dunno. After what happened last night, I wasn’t sure how – well – how comfortable you’d be.”

Louis shot him a considering look. “Because of how much we told each other?”

“Well. Sort of.” Harry met his eyes cautiously. “More because of how I almost made a move on you with your boyfriend right outside the door.” He almost mumbled the last words, his eyes shifting downward. Louis was trying his hardest not to break out into hysterical laughter.

“Harry, you didn’t-” Louis began with a reassuring smile, only to be cut off by Harry. His open edges and nervous smile warmed Louis’s heart.

“No, I _did_ Louis! I knew you had a boyfriend and I still almost kissed you even though I know Zayn and I like him too! I felt so bad and I-”

“Harry!” Louis exclaimed, cutting him off and shoving his palm over his mouth to stop him from rambling more.

“I’m not dating Zayn.”

One, two moments passed, Harry slowly blinking at the smaller boy. Louis shifted under his gaze and could almost see the gears in his brain shifting. Harry continued to look at him for a moment longer, but then a warm smile lit up his face. Louis’s brain told him it wouldn’t mind processing that smile of Harry’s forever. Louis slowly removed his palm from Harry’s mouth.

“Oh.”

They settled close together against the wall, shoulders just brushing. “Yeah, _oh,”_ Louis giggled. “Harry, why the _fuck_ would you think I’m dating Zayn?”

Harry finished up his coffee and shrugged, looking more embarrassed that Louis had ever seen before. “Well, you called him your _other half_ once, and you guys are always super close and touchy feely, and he was in your apartment talking about a _night in_ and-”

Louis couldn’t help breaking out into laughter then. Like, proper, uncontrolled laughter. He couldn’t help it, him and Zayn _dating_ was the funniest thing he had ever heard of. Harry glared at him and grumbled.

“Don’t laugh at me! It’s a reasonable assumption to make!”

“You could’ve asked me!”

“I did!” Harry exclaimed. Now that confused Louis. He was pretty sure he’d remember telling Harry he was _dating_ Zayn. When Louis didn’t reply, Harry continued, running a frustrated hand through his hair. “Last night? When you were talking about people you dated, I asked if you started dating Zayn when you went to uni and you agreed! Were you just playing around with me or something because I really don’t appreciate that-”

Louis reached for Harry’s hands. “You asked if I _met_ Zayn at uni! And _I_ _did_! How was I supposed to know you meant… _that!?”_

Harry sighed and interlaced his fingers with Louis’. “I mean, I guess that makes sense,” he cringed. “I, uh, I’m sorry. For assuming.”

“It’s okay,” Louis whispered back. “But, can I _please_ tell Zayn? He’ll honestly be crazy flattered that a movie star was jealous of him,” Louis snickered.

“I was not jealous,” Harry mumbled back, a small blush rising to his cheeks. God, Louis wanted to kiss him.

“Hm, sure love.”

Harry’s blush rose, and he pulled out his phone to keep himself distracted from Louis’ teasing smile. Louis settled into his place beside Harry, one of his hands still intertwined with the movie star’s. He chose to alternate between watching the film set and sending Harry sidelong glances. Harry’s phone was buzzing in his hand as he logged into Twitter. Louis waited with anticipation for him to find his newest Tweet.

The fallout came quickly. Harry gave a snort, his phone displaying the picture Louis had snapped of him earlier, shaking his head. “Honestly. You’re a sneaky little shit.”

“Don’t you swear at me Mr. Movie Star,” Louis joked.

Harry snorted again, but he didn’t look up from scrolling through his replies. Louis peeked over his shoulder, only feeling mildly guilty about spying but figuring it was okay when Harry didn’t move away. The replies had multiplied since Louis looked, but mostly they still consisted of the fangirlish squealing that Louis was slowly growing accustomed to.

Perhaps more worryingly, most of them also seemed to be using #larry.

Harry didn’t seem bothered as he chuckled at a few, but Louis felt it like a subtle itch under his skin. _A ship name about the two of them._ It was a little risky, wasn’t it? Especially as Harry was apparently trying to hide his bisexuality from the press. Even if him and Louis _did_ get together, Louis wasn’t entirely sure how he felt about the thought of thousands of people speculating about their relationship. He supposed Harry must be more used to it.

When the hashtag was continuously appearing, though, Louis couldn’t keep quiet for long. “Doesn’t it bother you?”

“Hm?” Harry barely looked up from his phone.

Louis swallowed. “The – you know, the tag, and the. Shipping. And stuff.” He could feel his cheeks growing hot, so Louis looked resolutely at the floor. “Doesn’t it bother you?”

Harry’s attention was immediately solely on Louis. His tone was light, oddly neutral. “Not really, no.”

“Oh.” Louis didn’t risk looking up from the ground.

He felt Harry shift a little closer, his shoulder pushing into Louis’s. “Does it bother you?”

Louis gnawed on his lip, considering. “…Not exactly.”

“But?” Harry prompted.

Louis sighed. “But – I don’t know. It’s a little … odd? Maybe?”

“I mean, it is,” Harry agreed, “But no worse than what newspapers do every day. Better, in fact – the people on Twitter at least care about me. Us.”

Louis risked a quick glance Harry’s way then. Harry was looking straight at him, his expression almost – inquisitive?

“I can tell them to back off if you’re uncomfortable,” Harry rushed to add.

Louis waved him away. “No, it’s – it’s ok, I think.”

“Tell me the minute it isn’t,” Harry demanded. “They’ll chill if I tell them to chill.”

Louis managed a half-smirk. “So much power.”

“Good job I’m benevolent.”

“Are you.”

Harry grinned, and the expression was so warm that Louis instantly decided this was worth it. Almost anything would be worth it if he got to stay close to Harry.

“Besides,” Harry added softly. “’ _Larry’._ You’ve got to admit, it’s got a ring to it.”

Louis made a confused face. “You think? There could be so many better options!”

“Yeah, but you know, our names work well together.”

Louis shook his head, ignoring the way that sentence made his stomach decide to do backflips. “Larry’s a bit unoriginal, don’t you think?”

Harry snorted. “Well, _sorry,_ Mr. Big Shot Editor.”

Louis shoved his side.

Harry almost fell with a snicker, catching himself by grabbing onto Louis’s arm. Louis steadied him readily enough, although it did nothing to calm his somersaulting stomach. They leaned into each other’s space, the movement so natural, and suddenly Harry’s face was right in front of Louis’s. Their eyes met, and everything stilled. The air around them grew warm.

The moment held, and Louis decided he never wanted to look away. Harry’s face was just so _interesting_ – elastic, it moved with his every expression when he wanted it to, his eyes open and vulnerable and _warm._ And the way he was studying Louis in return made Louis’s pulse start to flutter in his throat.

The moment couldn’t last, though.

The director called from the set, announcing the next scene’s filming, and Harry reluctantly drew away. He lingered a moment longer, fixing Louis with a small smile. “Come back tomorrow?”

“Always,” Louis promised, and there was no hesitation in his tone.

Harry’s smile grew. He lifted a hand in a wave as he returned to the set.

Louis stayed to watch him for as long as he could before he remembered his own need to get to work. He lingered for long enough for Zayn to roll his eyes at him, though, and make an exaggerated heart symbol with his hands.

Louis flipped him off before mouthing _“so much to tell you,”_ as he turned and headed back away from the set.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Annnd the Zouis miscommunication is finally cleared up! Don't worry, Jealous Harry™ will most definitely be making a comeback ;)
> 
> Thank you all for the wonderful comments and feedback on the previous chapters! Your support is really heartwarming. As always, don't forget to leave kudos and let me know what you think! 
> 
> xx


	9. IX

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tried experimenting with photos in this chapter! Let me know if you liked it and if I should include more. Oh and some cute Larry interactions for you all <3

_@lwt91:_ _I’m proud of this photo. Everyone wants to see @Harry_styles in a giant puffy raincoat, right?_

 _@Harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 you won’t get away with this Tomlinson grr_

 _@lwt91:_ _@Harry_styles fighting words but I don’t see a response_

 _@Harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 *image* this enough for u? what are u even doing here, that stack of books looks like it’s smothering u_

 _@lwt91:_ _stop stalking me @Harry_styles_

 _@Harry_styles:_ _@lwt91 no can do sorryyyy ;)_

Louis rolled his eyes, placing his phone back on the counter as he looked up to serve the next customer. He almost felt bad about abusing Liam’s wifi, but, well, he figured this cause was worth it. His Twitter _fights_ with Harry were quickly becoming one of the highlights of his days.

He turned to the customer with a smile. A slight queue had built up in his momentary lapse of attention, so he gave an apologetic smile to the young boy and his mother who were politely waiting for him to finish.

His stomach jolted when he saw the book they were buying.

“Oh, _‘Don’t Worry Darling’!_ ” Louis took the book, trying not to react too much. He shouldn’t be surprised – sales for the book had rocketed since news of the oncoming film, particularly here in Doncaster. Everyone wanted to know the source of all the fuss that had closed the majority of the roads in the centre of the city for several months.

Louis slipped the book into a bag and handed it to the boy with a smile, taking the money from his mother. As they moved away, he served the next few customers, which kept him busy for several minutes.

When Louis finally had a break again, he dug his phone out of his pocket to see a new text in his inbox.

 **_Harry:_ ** _hey u free? I wanna get off the set_

Louis held back a smile. He and Harry had been meeting up a lot more regularly, making the time to talk, usually by the ROAD CLOSED sign by the entrance to the film set. They’d grown a lot closer, too – Louis had learned just how awkward Harry truly was, and that he was secretly just a big softie who loved fluffy jumpers and had an insanely big ring collection (something he strove to hide from the press – didn’t suit his ‘cool’ image, apparently). They teased each other and poked fun and snapped sneaky photos to put on Twitter later, but for the most part, they were settling into a warm kind of friendship the likes of which Louis hadn’t really ever felt before. Sure, he was extremely close with Zayn and nothing would ever change that, but with Harry there was a natural ease and something _else_ that he hadn’t felt with anyone else.

But they’d only ever talked on the film set. So was this text Harry inviting him out?

Louis pursed his lips, typing out a quick reply before he had to go back to serving customers.

**_Louis:_** _aren’t you supposed to LIKE the set?_

**_Louis:_ ** _I have lunch break in an hour_

He busied himself with customers again, trying his best to keep on top of the queue – it was a Friday, close to lunchtime, and it was half term as well, so a lot of schoolkids were in as well as the usual lunchtime traffic. When he got a spare minute to check his phone again, Harry had replied.

_**Harry:** the set is supposed to like me actually :P_

_**Harry:** I’ll be at your shop in an hour_

Louis blinked. Harry was coming to fetch him, and everything? This was a new development. This felt more like actual _hanging out_ , as opposed to just casual meetings when they both happened to be in the same place at the same time. Harry constantly managed to throw Louis off, just when he was beginning to settle into the idea of being Harry’s friend.

They hadn’t discussed anything more … _personal_ since Harry showed up at Louis’s flat. But they had grown close, and Louis was really starting to crave Harry’s company. He liked Harry’s sarcasm, his quick humour, his awkward lankiness that he tried to hide behind his effortlessly cool image. (He even managed to look cool in his giant flowing film costume. Frankly, Louis thought that was a miracle). And, by some wonder, Harry seemed to enjoy Louis’s company, too. Their quick snatches of conversation turned into hour-long chats at the edges of the film set, until Harry got called back on set or Louis had to rush off to work. He’d been late three more times since meeting Harry, and Liam had taken to simply rolling his eyes at him.

Louis willed his work to go by quickly for the next hour, itching to see what Harry had planned. If he _had_ anything planned. Louis had learned rather quickly that Harry was actually quite shy and clumsy, and if he wanted something, he tended to act before thinking about the consequences. It wouldn’t surprise Louis at all if Harry turned up in full costume with a trail of fangirls at his heels with absolutely no idea what to do. He held back a shudder at the thought.

Louis was just putting some books back onto a shelf when the bell above the door rang. He slotted the book in his hand into place, left the rest in a neat pile to return to, and turned towards the door with his usual friendly smile in place.

He was not prepared to be stared back at by three teenagers – two girls and a boy.

Upon him looking at them, the three of them gasped. One girl hopped on her foot, pointing at him. “Ahh! It’s actually him!”

Louis instantly looked wary.

“Shush, you’re scaring him,” the other girl hissed, and the boy stepped in front of them both to face Louis.

Louis resisted the urge to edge back a step.

“Sorry,” the boy blurted after a few seconds too long of just staring. “Sorry, but – are you – um. Are you Louis Tomlinson?”

Louis blinked, hard.

One of the girls spoke then, looking a little mortified. “Sorry for just barging in – we didn’t think you worked here, but then I saw you through the window…”

“You look just like you do on Twitter,” the boy explained.

Louis swallowed his confusion and upset and plastered on a smile instead – it wasn’t their fault he’d somehow found himself embroiled in a Twitter photo war. So Louis managed to speak in a warm tone. “Oh! Yeah, I’m Louis. Sorry. I still kind of forget people might recognise me.”

“You’re amazing, though!” The boy enthused. “I love you and Harry – seriously, your photos are the funniest part of the day.”

“You’re doing everyone a service, taking them,” one of the girls piped up.

Louis’s smile didn’t waver as he considered those words. He supposed Harry’s fans must like the chance to see Harry in such a vulnerable and _human_ way – and, well, Louis had seen the tags. Their ship was still going strong. It was doing wonders for both his and Harry’s public profile.

“Could we – um –“ the boy stammered, holding up his phone. “Could we get a photo?”

Louis was bemused for a moment before he gathered together his scattered wits enough to agree. The three of them crowded around him and took several selfies, finding their voices the longer they were around him. They were nice people, and friendly, though Louis was still entirely too weirded out by the whole situation.

And then the bell above the door rang again, and Harry Styles himself walked in.

The reaction from the three was immediate. They grouped together with a shocked gasp, staring rapidly between Harry and Louis. Louis slightly wanted to get swallowed up by the floor.

Harry surveyed the scene in one glance. He arched a cool brow and focused in on Louis, amusement twitching the corner of his mouth. “What’s going on here?”

“Uh,” Louis answered weakly.

“Yeah?” Harry’s tone was amused. He took a step closer, and all three of the teenagers squeaked.

“Harry’s here to visit Louis!” One of the girls hissed. “It’s a date, isn’t it? It’s totally a date.”

“Shh! You can’t just say that!”

Louis closed his eyes and prayed even harder that the ground would open up and swallow him whole. Anything to save him from Harry’s raised brow and smug little smirk.

Harry, however, seemed to have no such misgivings. He strode on over to Louis and nudged his shoulder, his smirk only growing. “Got yourself a fan club while I was away, hm?”

Louis spluttered.

Harry gave a silvery laugh, but before he could say any more, the teens were back asking for more selfies, this time with the both of them. Louis was tempted to say no – he was tired, and this was beginning to eat into his precious lunch hour – but Harry, infuriatingly, was his usual charming self and offered to take as many photos as they wanted.

Although, Louis had to admit that standing next to Harry was rather pleasant, and it gave him an excuse to wrap an arm around Harry’s waist. So, all in all, the experience wasn’t _entirely_ bad.

Once the teens had gone, with many gushing thank-yous, Harry turned to Louis with a snort. “How long do you reckon it’ll take for that to go on Twitter? I’d bet under an hour.”

“How can you be so calm about this?” Louis questioned, still confused by the whole interaction.

Harry arched a brow, his smirk curling the corner of his lips again. “When you’re as famous as I am, Louis, you get used to this sort of thing.”

Louis shoved his side, grumbling, and Harry burst out laughing. Louis liked Harry’s laugh. It was loud and unashamed and made the corners of his eyes crinkle up, and he liked seeing Harry so warm and happy.

Louis tried not to analyse that emotion too much.

“Did you come here just to annoy me?” Louis grumbled, returning to his pile of books.

Harry shrugged, leaning against the shelf beside Louis, still smirking. “Not exactly. I consider it a happy accident.”

Louis glared at him, and Harry snickered again. He leaned into Louis’s side, and Louis tried to ignore the sudden rush of warmth that flooded through him whenever he and Harry touched. “I thought you had lunch break?”

“I do,” Louis confirmed.

“Want to spend it with me?”

“That sounds like the last thing I’d ever want to do,” he replied, but his tone was teasing and his chuckle gave him away.

“Rude,” Harry joked back.

Louis grinned at him. “Give me two minutes to put the rest of these books away, and then we can go.”

Harry’s face brightened right up again, and Louis had to bite back a coo.

…

_“Red suspenders?!”_

Louis sipped his coffee, staring down at the tabletop with the back of his neck growing hot. “I just really liked them, ok?”

Harry let out another burst of warm laughter, the corners of his eyes crinkling right up. “Why? Were they a special sort of suspenders?”

Louis flicked a grain of the muffin they were sharing at him, and Harry instantly dived away with a squeal.

Louis laughed at him.

“Rude!” Harry huffed. “If you got any of that on this shirt, I’m going to have to get my manager to sue you.”

Louis arched a brow, surveying Harry’s appearance. He’d managed to change out of his costume before heading over to meet Louis, but he wasn’t as dressed down as the time he’d been over to Louis’s house. Instead, Harry was wearing a white shirt and fluffy brown coat that was probably a lot more expensive than it looked, and skinny jeans so tight that they must have been cutting off blood circulation to his ankles. His hair wasn’t styled for his character this time, so Harry was sporting his trademark fluffy curls. It made him look a lot more like Alex, his character from _Kiwi._ Needless to say, that wasn’t helping Louis’s blood pressure any.

If Harry noticed Louis’s prolonged staring, he didn’t comment. Harry looked almost out of place in such a homely setting as the café right next to Louis’s bookshop – with his long limbs folded awkwardly into the booth beside Louis, and his large hands wrapped comfortably around a mug. It was hard to reconcile this person with the Harry Styles on the film set every day, teasing Louis with a smirk and snapping odd photos of him.

Thinking of odd photos –

Louis dug his phone out of his pocket, attempting to be inconspicuous. He opened it up, glancing out of the window in pretence as a moment of comfortable silence settled between them. Harry was busy sipping, so Louis took the opportunity to fumble out his camera app and snap a sly photo.

Only – he’d forgotten to turn off the sound. So when he snapped the photo, the loud _click_ echoed throughout their corner of the coffee shop.

Harry paused mid-sip. He sent Louis a tired, almost disappointed glare over the rim of his mug, and Louis felt the back of his neck grow hot again. He shoved his phone back into his pocket with a defiant twist to his lips. “What?!”

Harry shook his head, but his lips were twitching as he set down his mug. “Honestly, if you want a photo, at least let me use my phone.”

“ _Your_ phone?”

“Yeah, at least then the quality would be decent.” Harry reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone with another snicker. “Maybe we could post selfie again – that made the internet explode last time.”

Louis snorted, muttering under his breath, “Largely down to you.”

“Oh, no, Tomlinson,” Harry berated. “This is just as much your fault as mine.”

“You’re the one who’s a famous actor,” Louis pointed out.

Harry shook his head. “And you’re the one who keeps teasing them with sneaky photos.”

“You started the photo war!”

“Because you were being incredibly annoying,” Harry smirked. “And you still are, for that matter.”

Louis raised an eyebrow. He snatched up the rest of his half of the muffin, muttering, “I’ll give you _annoying,_ you’re the one practically stalking me.”

Louis took a little too much pride in the way Harry choked on his coffee at that.

“Honestly,” Harry griped when he managed to catch his breath. “I don’t know why I put up with you in the first place – thought you’d had enough of arrogant actors picked for their pretty faces.”

“Hey!” Louis put on an expression of mortal offence.

“What? You literally said that the first time we met.”

Louis laughed and closed his eyes. Dealing with Harry Styles required a huge amount of patience. Their conversations were always filled with this endless back-and-forth, constant teasing, and never-ending bickering. Yet, for some reason, it was the most fun Louis had had in a long time.

“You’re never going to let how we met go, are you?” Louis asked eventually.

Harry shook his head with a delighted grin. “Never.”

“If I’d known it was you, I never even would have said anything,” Louis muttered darkly into his coffee.

Harry blinked. Then he was suddenly leaning across the table, one hand half-reaching out to Louis before he seemed to think better of it and tucked his fingers back under the table. He drummed them against his knee rapidly as he fixed Louis with an interested gaze. “Oh?”

Louis lifted one shoulder in a half-shrug. “Well, I mean. I certainly wouldn’t have treated you the way I did.”

Harry pursed his lips, considering that statement. In the half-silence that followed, occupied only by the background chattering of their fellow café-goers, Louis was beginning to fear that he’d said the wrong thing, or accidentally offended Harry somehow.

“I’m glad you said what you did,” Harry said instead. Louis looked at him uncomprehendingly.

“I mean, you were offensive,” Harry conceded with a small smirk, “But I can’t deny it was refreshing.”

Louis stared at him. “ _Refreshing?_ ”

“Yeah.”

“You find being insulted _refreshing_?”

“There’s no need to sound so upset about it,” Harry laughed, “It gets you off the hook, after all.”

Louis shook his head, his face settling into an unhappy pout. “Yeah, but I don’t much like what that says about you.”

“How kind.”

“No, I didn’t mean –” Louis sighed, placing both hands flat on the table. “I meant, that implies that you prefer being insulted to complimented.”

“…Maybe, yeah.”

“Well, I don’t much like that,” Louis insisted, although he refused to meet Harry’s eyes. Saying this next sentence might just prove to be a mistake, but it felt like a risk he should afford to take. “You’re really great at what you do. You should like getting told that.”

When Louis risked a quick glance over to Harry, he saw Harry’s expression soften into something warm and tender. He offered Louis a small smile, which Louis hesitantly returned.

“Thanks,” Harry finally spoke again, his tone low. “I appreciate that.”

“Well, I mean it.”

“Aww. We’ve come so far.”

Louis rolled his eyes and leaned over the table to give Harry’s shoulder a shove. Harry snickered at him, but proceeded to almost fall out of their booth, so he was forced to grab onto Louis’s arm not to go sprawling onto the floor in the centre of the coffee shop. Louis wrapped his arm around his shoulders and tried not to think too much about it as he carefully righted Harry.

Harry seemed to be thinking along the same lines, though, as he grabbed Louis’s wrist before Louis could move too far away. “Really, though. I’m grateful. I was a bit rude to you, as well – back then.”

Louis arched a brow. “Only back then?”

“Shut up,” Harry laughed. “I just meant I assumed you knew nothing about film. But actually you’re a pretty awesome editor, according to Zayn.”

Louis’s smile was more genuine this time. “I’m glad you and him are getting along.”

“Of course, how could we not?” Harry joked.

Louis smirked, and Harry dissolved back into laughter.

…

They spent the rest of Louis’s lunch break devouring another muffin and swapping stories about their favourite hobbies. Luckily, Harry agreed that football was the best sport, so there wasn’t any need for another argument there. They went into great depth over their favourite musicians, and then somehow got into a passionate discussion about 70s rock bands, and honestly Harry was starting to seem more than a little bit perfect. Sure, he ranted a bit more about guitar strings and bassists than Louis was entirely used to, but it was refreshing to finally have someone he could talk to for hours about anything and everything. Zayn could only take so much.

Eventually, though, they had to return to the real world. A short time later, Harry’s phone buzzed in his pocket when he was mid-rant.

“So you see, there’s really no reason why they didn’t stick to Peter Green’s original melody,” Harry was still saying absentmindedly as he pulled his phone out.

Louis pursed his lips. “But surely it was because the drums _had_ to be changed in order to accommodate the new bassline?”

“Then they might as well have made an entirely different song, Louis, think about it.” Harry’s tone became a little more distracted, however, and he frowned at his screen.

Louis debated continuing the argument, but decided the more pressing matter was checking that Harry was ok. So he set down his mug and leaned a little closer. “What’s up?”

“Hm?” Harry looked up, then quickly slid his phone away with a sigh. “Oh, nothing. They need me back on the set soon, that’s all.”

“Ah.” Louis tried not to sound too disappointed. He had been deliberately avoiding checking the time for fear of knowing that his lunch hour must be well over by now.

“Yeah.” It was a small comfort, but Harry sounded just as reluctant as Louis. But he still got to his feet, leaving Louis feeling a little hollow. “I’d stay, only I’m scared Niall will try and rip the set out from under me.”

A crease appeared in Louis’s brow as he followed suit. “Niall?”

“Yeah.” Harry slung his jacket over his shoulders, fixing Louis with a slightly amused stare. “Niall Horan? He’s playing the other lead.”

“Oh!” Louis’s expression cleared a little, thinking back to the book and the character.

“Yeah.” Harry let out a sigh. “He’s nice, probably, but he keeps getting grumpy that he doesn’t have many lines. The film’s had to edit his character quite a lot – he’s a bit put out, you know, since he doesn’t have as much to do as me and I’m apparently a _newbie_.”

Louis shook his head, holding the door open for Harry as they made their way outside. “Film set politics. Mostly why I prefer staying behind the scenes.”

“I could almost agree with you.”

“Don’t lie, Haz, you couldn’t survive without at least fifty cameras on you all at once.”

“You’re a liar and a heathen,” Harry huffed, but he was smiling again, much to Louis’s relief. “Besides, not everyone on the film set is bad. Taylor is adorable.”

“Taylor?”

“Yeah – the one playing Estelle?” Harry rolled his eyes at Louis’s blank look, scoffing, “God Lou, you’re the worst fan in the world.”

“Just because I don’t keep up with you crazy celebrities!”

“Yes, but you’ve literally seen Taylor every single day you’ve come on set.”

“…Oh.” Louis paused, a little thrown. He narrowed his eyes. “Wait. The blonde one?”

Harry looked mortally offended. “She’d hate to be referred to by only her hair colour, but yeah,” his face wrinkled up, “ _The blonde one_.”

“Oh.” Louis pursed his lips as they walked down the street back towards his bookshop. He’d only caught a few glimpses of the blonde actress from afar, but she’d seemed bubbly and smiley and she always took time to talk to any fans that were waiting by the set, so she couldn’t be all that bad. Plus, Harry liked her.

Louis’s stomach dropped a little when they were outside his bookshop again, and he hovered by the door, looking at Harry. “Will you be ok getting back to the set?”

Harry rolled his eyes. “I think I can manage a walk through a city in broad daylight in the middle of the day, yes.”

“Sarky,” Louis huffed. “I just don’t want you to get mobbed by screaming fans.”

“That really isn’t that bad –”

“Ok, go now,” Louis snorted, giving Harry a shove. “You’re _insufferable_.”

“Whatever you say.” Harry was grinning, but he paused before walking away. “Oh, also, don’t tell anyone what I said about the film. Sworn to secrecy, and all that.”

“I’ll post it on Twitter tonight,” Louis promised. “Along with photos of you in your costume that I’ve secretly been hoarding away.”

“You _haven’t_.”

Louis shrugged. “Blackmail fodder.”

“You’re the worst.” Harry sent him a final glare, on the edge of turning on his heels to begin his walk back to the film set.

Louis just grinned sweetly back at him, but he stayed waiting by the door for as long as Harry was still in sight.

…

When he got back from work that evening and curled up with his usual TV and football fix, Louis realised that Harry actually had Tweeted a selfie from their coffee trip earlier, and it had sparked the usual reaction from his fans. The shipping tag ‘ _larry’_ was going wild again, and everyone seemed to be thinking that they’d been on a coffee date. _A date?_

It was the same assumption that the fans in Louis’ bookstore had made, but after that, the thought didn’t cross Louis’s mind. But now the idea had been put there, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. Was that a date? It could also just have been a nice trip out as friends. In fact, that was more than certainly what it _was_.

Louis felt a little shocked when he realised he was _disappointed_ with that. 

Feeling a bit more curious than he’d like, Louis pulled up his laptop and googled the tag _‘larry.’_ Immediately, he was bombarded with a slew of articles from tabloids and entertainment gossip websites. Hesitantly, he clicked the first link.

**_Harry Styles Living It Up In Doncaster? All about #Larry and Why We Are SO HERE FOR IT!_ **

_Our favourite new actor Harry Styles (21) has been filming the much-anticipated film adaptation of ‘Don’t Worry Darling’ in the quiet town of Doncaster for quite some time now._

_Has the Hollywood Heartthrob started a new life up North? Recent insider sources claim that Styles has gotten fairly close and intimate with a few locals, especially with one particularly dashing young man. So who is this mystery man, and how is he connected to our Harry?_

_From Styles’ recent Tweets, it seems like our mystery man was a fan of the film who accidently found his way on set, and thus into the life of the one and only Harry Styles. Talk about a happy accident! Since then, the pair have become instant friends, and can often be seen sharing quirky images of the other in what fans are now calling a ‘photowar.’ Talk about adorable!_

_In fact, our inside sources say that the two have become very close in the short period of time. Styles has been seen visiting the mystery man at work, sharing coffee and even snuggling up together in cafes! Talk about best friend goals! Fans of Styles have started calling the pair #Larry, a combination of their names. Could you get any cuter than that? For exclusive and intimate images of the pair cuddled up in the café, click the link below!_

_Best friend goals,_ he snorted. Hesitantly, Louis’ cursor hovered over the link. After a quick internal debate, Louis decided to click it, closing his eyes just before the page loaded up. After counting to 10, he opened his eyes slowly.

**_AN EXCLUSIVE LOOK INTO #LARRY!_ **

**_Has Hollywood Heartthrob Harry Styles found himself in a new kind of relationship?_ **

_Nope._ Louis immediately closed the link and shoved his laptop away. He didn't even realise anyone noticed them, or bothered to _take pictures._ No matter how hard he tried, aspects of Harry's life just seemed so foreign to him. 

Although, he had to admit that him and Harry looked adorable together. Like they _fit._ He didn’t even realise how close they were sitting in the moment, or how content and comfortable they looked with each other. It made his heart flutter. Maybe he’d save that photo for later. 

Louis shook his head, pushing those thoughts far away to the back of his skull, burying them under a blanket and smothering them into silence. He didn’t want to think about what his feelings might mean. Because as much as he liked Harry, and as happy as these last few weeks had been, if he wasn’t happy being just friends with Harry, then that implied he wanted something … _more._

And, quite frankly, the idea of that terrified Louis.

Sure he liked Harry, a lot, but he wasn’t sure if a relationship with him was something that would fit into his life – not yet, anyway. Maybe, years in the future, when he had a job he loved and a pretty little house out in the country somewhere, he’d thought it might have been nice to have someone to share that future with. But not _yet._ Not when he was drowning in his studies, and Harry seemed too good to be true.

 _Stop._ Louis savagely ordered his brain to shut up, closing his eyes. Louis had never been one for overthinking. He tended to just allow events to play out, floating along with them as best as he could with minimal time to freak out. He didn’t want to change that. He didn’t want to let Harry Styles any more into his head than he already was.

So Louis turned back to the TV and tried to drown out his thoughts with an old favourite film (it didn’t help that his go-to feel better film was ‘ _Kiwi,_ so Louis was forced to choose something more mediocre).

But no matter what he did, Louis couldn’t get Harry Styles’s crinkly-eyed laughter out of his head

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi guys!! What did you think of the photo? Should I use them more often?? Any and all feedback is welcome!! 
> 
> Once again, thanks so much for reading, commenting, and leaving kudos. Love you all xx


	10. X

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm so excited for this one!! Larry finally opening up about their feelings... and maybe more?? 
> 
> ALSO HOLY FUCK HARRY WON A GRAMMY

5am was a ridiculous time that never should have been invented.

Louis tucked his hands into his jacket pocket, glaring down at the pavement. At this point, Harry was just being unnecessarily cruel, forcing Louis to brave the outside world at this stupid time in the morning. And, worst of all, this wasn’t even the _first time._ Harry had got into the rather nasty habit of texting Louis whenever his shift of filming was over so they could meet up, which originally had seemed like a really sweet thing to do. Until Louis realised that Harry’s shifts finished at the worst times, like _5 o’clock in the morning._

(Secretly, Louis knew he could say no, but any time with Harry was precious and important and he was apparently willing to do literally anything to try and see him as much as possible).

Louis lingered on the edge of the set, watching the final scene draw to a close. They’d been doing a night shoot, Nick had informed him earlier, with only the most dedicated of workers present. Not even Zayn had braved this time of morning. Despite the fact that spring was just poking its head around the corner, the mornings still bit with darkness and frost, and it was uncomfortably chilly to be outside.

Louis relished in the fact that he at least got to wear a jacket. Harry was stuck in his flimsy little thin shirt with his hair all slicked back. Not that it looked like it bothered him – he wasn’t even shivering, the stupidly good actor that he was. Louis felt more sorry for the blonde actress he was working with. Taylor, he remembered, smiling slightly to himself and proud that he _actually_ remember this time. She was stuck in a long, filmy dress that looked like it was made out of some thin type of silk. It was a gorgeous shade of blue, but she looked absolutely frozen.

Louis straightened his back when the scene finally ended and the actors were dismissed for the time being. Harry didn’t come straight over, though – which, _of course he didn’t,_ never mind that he literally dragged Louis out of bed at this ungodly hour and then didn’t even bother to come speak to him – instead waiting for a minute to chat with the blonde actress. She laughed along with him. Louis almost wanted to glare at her.

But then he shoved that thought deep back in the irrational part of his brain, where it belonged.

Harry glanced over and saw Louis, giving a smile and a jaunty little wave. Louis couldn’t help but wave back, already feeling a little warmer. He didn’t need to be so bitter. Harry wasn’t going to just ignore him – he didn’t do that. Despite being so well known, he always had time for Louis. Louis was weirdly proud of that.

Harry headed Louis’s way, but the blonde actress was coming with him. Louis tried his best not to panic. She was probably stupidly famous and he was about to make an idiot of himself in front of Harry again. Louis tried to communicate all this to Harry through wild eye-gestures, but Harry just grinned back at him in a way that wasn’t at all reassuring. And the gap between them was growing ever smaller.

Eventually, Louis just leaned back against the wall and plastered his best, winning smile on his face.

“Lou!” Harry called as soon as he was close enough, and ok, the way his entire face brightened when he said Louis’s name was maybe worth all of this stress.

“What time do you call this, Harry?” Louis grumbled in response, but smiled as Harry wrapped a comforting arm around his waist. “It’s literally before dawn.”

“Hey, I warned you about my weird schedule.”

“I don’t think you ever did, actually.”

“Really?”

“Nope, you just started texting me at weird times.” Louis pushed away from the wall and grinned at Harry’s slightly disgruntled look. “Not that I’m really complaining if you can’t keep away from me.”

“You are the _worst person,_ ” Harry huffed.

“I’m flattered.”

“See?” Harry shook his head, turning to the actress at his side with a dramatic hand gesture. “He’s the _literal_ worst.”

“Well, then I think you’re perfect for each other,” she answered, her voice bubbling with mirth.

Louis blinked at her.

“I’m Taylor,” she explained, holding out a hand for him to shake. “And you must be Louis, unless Harry’s got a secret harem of attractive men waiting on him.”

Harry spluttered. Louis, however, was already smiling, feeling a lot more at ease as he shook her hand. “Well, if he has, then he’s been keeping the rest of them secret from me.”

“I never had him pegged as a cheater.” Taylor sent Harry a disparaging look as she released Louis’s hand. “It’s always the quiet ones.”

“Are you kidding me?” Louis snorted. “Harry is anything _but_ quiet.”

“Well, that’s true,” she amended. “I suppose you’re ok, then, he probably isn’t cheating.”

“Standing right here, you know,” Harry said indignantly.

Louis ignored him in favour of smiling back at Taylor. She was tall, and her smile was bright and warm, and she always seemed to be glowing. He liked her instantly. “So, I suppose you’re playing Estelle?”

“I am, yes.” Taylor beamed. “Do you know the story?”

Louis nodded eagerly. “I’m a huge fan of the book. Read it as a teenager.”

“Me, too,” Taylor sighed happily. “It’s a dream job. Even if I have to work with clumsy idiots like Styles.”

Louis held back a smirk. “I can see why that would be such a trial for you.”

“ _Literally_ still standing here,” Harry huffed.

Taylor laughed, surprisingly loudly for her rather gentle image. Louis laughed with her and placed a gentle hand on Harry’s arm. He leaned into his side, chuckling, “Don’t worry love, only teasing.”

“You’re both incredibly rude,” Harry said through a scowl, but he leaned into Louis’ touch nonetheless.

Louis smirked at him, “Not as rude as getting me out of bed at 5 in the morning.”

“You’re lucky you’ve even been to bed,” Harry shot back, “Some of us have been working all night.”

Louis’s eyes widened a little as he looked between Harry and Taylor – who, admittedly, did look a little tired. “You haven’t been home yet?”

Taylor shook her head, yawning. “Been filming since 7pm. I’m _exhausted,_ my dears.”

“That’s because you’re old.” Harry patted her shoulder. “But don’t worry, I won’t hold it against you.”

“Watch your back, Styles.” Taylor smacked his arm gently, and Louis was surprised to feel a spark of jealousy at the easy way she touched Harry. He buried that feeling quickly. That was a foolish thought. He had literally no claim over Harry. And Taylor seemed genuinely lovely.

“Right,” Taylor yawned again, stepping away from Harry and giving both of them a quick wave. “I have to leave you lovelies, I’m so tired and I have a date with some lovely pasta sitting in my microwave.”

“Sounds delightful,” Harry muttered.

Louis shoved him, muttering, “Be polite.” He ignored Harry’s rather dangerous glare in favour of smiling at Taylor, saying, “That sounds delicious. Say hi to it from me.”

Taylor sent him a delighted smile. “I will. It was lovely to meet you, Louis. I’ve heard so much about you.” Was Louis imagining the way Harry stared at the ground, and the rather meaningful look Taylor seemed to direct Harry’s way?

“Oh,” Louis answered lamely when he realised he’d left silence for a little too long, “Well, I hope good things.”

“From this one?” Taylor jerked a thumb in Harry’s direction, grinning, “Of course only good things.”

Louis smiled weakly. Harry was still staring at the ground.

“I’ll see you tonight, Harry,” Taylor finished as she began to head away. “Try to remember to sleep in between spoiling your boyfriend.”

“ _Taylor,_ ” Harry hissed, but she was already gone with a final chuckle and a wave.

Louis stood, a little dumbfounded in the wake of that quite strange conversation. He’d never had someone be so familiar with him from knowing him for such a little amount of time. Just what exactly had Harry been saying about him?

And as for being called Harry’s _boyfriend_ – well – that wasn’t what they were yet. Was it? Harry had never said so, and Louis would never in a million years have the courage to bring that up.

“Sorry about her,” Harry apologised quickly, and Louis turned to see him still staring down at the ground. “She’s a bit…” he waved a hand indeterminately, “…Full on.”

“I noticed.”

“I am so sorry.” Harry grimaced, daring to flick a glance up to meet Louis’s gaze. “I hope she didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

“No, no, not at all,” Louis was quick to reassure. “I liked her.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. And she likes teasing you, so we have that in common.”

Harry scowled. “You’re both the worst. I never should have introduced you.”

“Probably not,” Louis agreed with a low chuckle. He tilted his head, regarding Harry more closely – he’d wrapped himself up in a big puffy raincoat again, hiding his costume from view, but he was still shivering a little. Plus, he looked absolutely exhausted. Louis pursed his lips. “Are you sure you still want to do something?”

“Hm?” Harry blinked. “Oh! Yeah, definitely. I mean. If you do?”

“I do,” Louis promised, and allowed himself a small smile. “But we’re getting coffee and sitting somewhere warm, you look dead on your feet.”

Harry’s lips twitched. “Just let me get changed, and we’ll go find a café.”

…

Louis sat his takeaway coffee mug down and shifted his gaze to Harry. They’d grabbed drinks and headed back outside – the sun was beginning to peek over the horizon, and Louis had assured Harry that he hadn’t really lived until he’d watched the sun rise over the city from the bank of the river. When they’d found seats by one of the bridges, in the quiet of the early morning with the horizon just beginning to taint orange, Louis found himself at peace. This place was calm and beautiful, and he was happy to share this soft, tranquil moment with Harry.

Except, Harry had gone all quiet, and he was looking steadfastly at the ground and blinking slowly rather than meeting Louis’s eyes.

Louis clicked his tongue, nudging Harry slightly with his shoulder. “What wrong, love?”

“Um. Nothing.” Harry was slurring his words a little, which alerted Louis to the fact that Harry was probably a bit more tired than he let on earlier. Harry didn’t say anything more, though, instead continuing to have a staring contest with the ground. Although, he did lean his body weight deeper into Louis’ side. The silence stretched on. Louis shifted, but Harry still refused to look up, and his eyes were beginning to flutter shut.

“Hey, Hazza,” Louis prompted gently. “You tired?”

Harry peeked up at Louis through his curls, and Louis couldn’t help but smile. Harry was out of costume, in a comfortable jumper, _again_ – seriously, Louis was beginning to think he had an unhealthy obsession with baggy jumpers – and his curls were flopping into his eyes, tinted warm brown in the early rays of the sun.

“I mean,” Louis continued when Harry still didn’t say anything, “I’m slightly worried about you falling asleep on me out here,” he joked.

“No, no, it’s fine! I’ll just finish my coffee and be fine.” Harry was quick to reassure. Louis arched a brow.

“Well, ok,” Harry amended, “I _may_ have not slept in like two days—“

“Harry!”

“—But its okay! I promise.”

“It absolutely is not” Louis huffed.

Harry smiled, and averted his eyes to the ground again. “Just, don’t wanna leave you yet,” he mumbled. Louis heart swelled. He glanced at the sleepy boy next to him in awe. He was _fucked._

“Well, if you want..” Louis began slowly, “We could go back to my place?”

Harry’s eyebrows rose sharply and he grabbed for his coffee mug to hide his face. Louis’ cheeks flamed up.

“I mean, I have a bed. And, um. We can nap? Finally get some rest in before you have to go back to set?”

Harry sent him a long, considering look – the kind that made Louis want to wriggle in his seat and run far, far away.. Harry’s eyes had this intense way of staring that made it seem almost as if he was looking right _through_ you, as if there was nowhere to hide. Louis ordinarily didn’t feel like he _had_ to hide, but lately, he’d been feeling … _feelings_ … about Harry that would be much safer kept buried deep under wraps.

“Really?” Harry finally said, his intense gaze not leaving Louis for a second.

Louis shifted, but reached out to take Harry’s hand in his. “Yeah H, course.”

Harry’s lips twitched. He placed his now mug back down and began to stand up. Louis stood too, reaching out to intertwine their fingers together in a manner that had become so _comfortable_ lately. In the red rays of dawn, Harry was absolutely breath-taking. Louis had never had that thought about anyone before.

“Now c’mon sleepy head,” Louis chuckled, tugging on their joined hands and leading Harry in the direction of his flat.

…

It was a miracle harry made it all the way back to the apartment without passing out. As soon as the pair reached the flat, Harry immediately flopped onto Louis’ sofa, head first. It was adorable. Shrugging his coat off, Louis walked over to Harry, now trying to make himself comfortable on the slightly too small sofa. He poked his cheek.

“Hey,” he whispered.

“Hmmm,” Harry groaned back.

“C’mon. I do have a proper bed y’know.” His cheeks flushed thinking about all the possible _meanings_ that sentence could have.

Begrudgingly, Harry turned around to look up at Louis with his giant, puppy dog eyes. Louis swore he swooned.

“Up up up,” Louis mumbled reaching his hands out towards Harry, a habit he had gotten used to saying to his little siblings when they tried to fall asleep in unlikely places. Harry reached out and grabbed Louis’ hands, the warmth immediately spreading through both of them. Harry let himself be dragged towards Louis’ bedroom.

It was very evident that Louis’ apartment was cold, almost as cold as the chilly winds outside. But Harry didn’t seem to mind anyway. As soon as he entered Louis’ room, he began shrugging off his fluffy jumper, revealing his bare torso to the cool air. Louis’ eyes widened, his mind a flurry of _chest, tattoos, abs, Harry, tattoos, fuck._

He blinked. That was unexpected to say the least, but Harry didn’t seem to mind, as he began climbing into Louis’ bed. He turned and looked up at Louis expectantly. Louis raised an eyebrow.

“C’mon,” Harry continued, pulling the covers up to reveal an empty space next to him and _oh. OH._ Harry wanted them to nap _together._

Blinking out of his trance, Louis’s feet seemed to move without him realizing, and he climbed into the open space beside Harry, facing Harry and hiding his face in his chest. That way Harry didn’t need to see his face, which he assumed would be a bright red.

Harry was apparently a _massive_ cuddler though. As soon as Louis entered his space, he immediately wrapped an arm around his waist, drawing him closer. He hummed a content sigh. Louis drew a hand up towards Harry’s fluffy hair, carding his hands softly through the soft curls, and Harry nuzzled into Louis’ neck. Louis felt like he died and went to heaven. He never wanted to leave.

“I’m glad you liked Taylor,” Harry mumbled thoughtfully against Louis’ neck. “I’m glad she didn’t make you uncomfortable.”

“Why would she have made me uncomfortable?” Louis whispered.

Harry hummed “Doesn’t matter. If she didn’t.”

“No,” Louis pressed, narrowing his eyes slightly and turning his head to face Harry. Their eyes locked. “What do you think is getting to me Haz?.”

Harry met his eyes, but his expression was guarded. Louis didn’t like that. He’d been getting used to reading Harry’s emotions from the play of his features, understanding the way his open expression moved with his thoughts. But, when he wanted to be, Harry could be as closed as a sheet of clouded ice.

“It’s nothing important,” Harry eventually answered. “She can just take things too far sometimes.”

Louis considered that slowly. “Well, I mean, she seems to,” he acknowledged after a moment, “But that’s nothing more than I’m used to with you.”

“Oi,” Harry grumbled.

“And she was really friendly.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Louis was honestly confused by this conversation, his tone matching his inner turmoil. “Unless you think she said something bad?”

Harry looked at him closely. “Don’t _you?_ ”

Louis wracked his brains, trying to remember what on earth Harry might be getting at, but he just came back more lost than ever. “…No?”

“But she called you my boyfriend.” The words dropped from Harry’s lips almost inaudibly, and he instantly went back to staring at anything except Louis.

Louis was brought up short.

“I mean, we haven’t really discussed anything, and I didn’t know I you might be uncomfortable with that,” Harry clarified, his words low and running together. Louis leaned closer, placing his hands on Harry’s cheeks as he rambled on, his sleepy voice slurring the words together. “What with – I mean – I don’t want you to feel pressured, or pushed, or anything, and I’m not even saying you _would_ feel that because it’s _fine_ …”

“Harry,” Louis interrupted – or tried to.

“No, like,” Harry shook his head. “Like I said, it’s _fine_ , I mean, I don’t even know if you’re looking for a relationship and – and, I mean – you’re _not_ my boyfriend, obviously, so…”

Louis tried to ignore the sudden shard of sharp glass that felt like it was ripping down his windpipe. He _wasn’t_ Harry’s. He had no claim to Harry. He hated that.

“Harry,” Louis tried again. Harry met his eyes. “ _Baby_ ,” he whispered, his hands stroking Harry’s face softly as the arm around his waist tightened. “Trust me, I don’t mind.” His gaze darted from Harry’s piercing emerald eyes to his lips, all soft and luscious and _kissable._

Harry was still, but made no move to push Louis away. Taking this as a positive sign, Louis dared his luck further, moving closer until his lips barely brushed against Harry’s, testing the waters.

Almost immediately, Harry responded by crashing their lips together, all traces of sleep seemingly vanishing instantly. His movements took Louis by surprise, who let out a startled _hmm_ at his actions. Harry didn’t mind though, pressing into Louis deeper as their lips moved in sync.

Daring to push his luck further, Louis moved the pair around so that he was now encaging Harry under his body as he hovered over him. Their mouths never disconnected, and Louis slipped his tongue into Harry’s eliciting a small moan from the other.

“Lou,” Harry breathed in between kisses.

“Hmm,” Louis whispered back as their heated session naturally faded, and they settled into sharing small, innocent pecks. Louis shifted his weight off his elbows and turned to face Harry again, settling into his side and wrapping an arm around him. “I promise I didn’t plan this when I said we should nap,” he chuckled.

“And here I thought this was your elaborate plan to get me into bed,” Harry joked, but the sleep had creeped its way into his voice again, and he let out a small yawn. Louis placed small kisses into Harry’s head of curls. Just when Louis thought Harry was falling asleep, he spoke again, quietly.

“So, just to be clear,” Harry started, sounded a little relieved, which warmed Louis’s heart a little, “You’re open to having a boyfriend…?

Louis bit his lip trying to contain his smile. “Yeah Haz, I am.”

Harry let out an audibly relieved sigh, his words slurring again with sleep “Okay. Okay that's _great_! I mean - Yeah. Um, I mean, I just – I was worried Taylor was taking things too far, and I wanted to make sure you were ok.”

Louis smiled, feeling warm. “That’s really sweet of you.”

“Shut up.” Harry was sounding all flustered again – he needed to stop that, it was bad for Louis’s heart.

“And to be honest, if I was going to get offended by that, then your fan base and I would have needed to have a long talk by now,” Louis added wryly.

Harry gave a short, sharp laugh. “I’m far too sleepy to be having this conversation,” Harry finally huffed out a laugh.

Louis chewed his lip. “Sorry, yeah, We can sleep now. And I mean it literally.”

Harry’s sleepy voice was sounding softly now, like a gentle caress in Louis’s ear. “Ok. Good. Goodnight love.”

Louis smiled, content and at peace wrapped up in Harry’s arms as he whispered a small _goodnight_ back before closing his eyes and drifting off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CAN YOU BELIEVE HARRY MOTHERFUCKING STYLES IS NOW A GRAMMY WINNER?!?!?!?! AFJSJSJKAJS I STAYED UP FOR LIKE 24 HOURS STRAIGHT AND IM SO INCREDIBLY PROUD OF HIM. after a decade of stanning him, my heart is so unbelievably filled with pride and love and joy. hope you all got to watch the grammys! 
> 
> oh and hope you enjoyed the chapter too ;)   
> as always, comments and kudos are greatly appreciated!!


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